Flight Priority Order

Helicopter Flight Information

There is a simple Order of Priority that I teach in helicopter flying

Safety, Profile, and Precision

When a student first solos, there must be an established order of the objectives of each flight. I maintain that all my students use the above practice. This pertains primarily to flying the traffic pattern, but this is also a good basic rule-of-thumb.

Safety

Above all else, the flight must remain safe. There is nothing so important that it is worth jeopardizing the safety of the flight. A student, or practicing pilot should not be so focused on the precision, that the flight becomes unstable and ultimately unsafe. Remember always that you should not put yourself in a position that forces you to do something that is unsafe. This could be flying until you are so low on fuel that you absolutely must land, it could be that you let job pressure or the influence of non-pilots talk you into landing in a location that you know is unsafe. There are any number of things that could lead to unsafe decisions. Another is just simply wanting to get the helicopter on the ground - you must not do that!

Profile

Only after the flight is safe, must the student or pilot focus on the profile. Then the profile should be worked at to achieve the desired results. After achieving the proper profile, then precision may become the goal.

Precision

After the flight is without any doubt safe, and the proper profile has been established, then and only then is it acceptable to work at precision.

Never lose sight of this rule of order, even after you have obtained your ratings. This will ensure that all flights remain safe.

Common errors for students for example is the approach to the traffic pattern where the target is the runway numbers. the student has some difficulty getting the profile which will take them precisely to the numbers on the glide path they wanted; as a result, they forfeit a stabilized approach and end up in either a high or low approach which has drifted outside the margin of safety for the type of flight. The student should have accepted the fact that they were not going to make the numbers, then re-stabilize the approach to a more suitable location on the runway such as the aiming point markers for example.

The whole purpose of practice, practice, practice is to become more precise without going outside of the margins of safety.

Hit Counter