Navy or USCG? helicopter water rescue

"It looks like a couple of Navy or Coast Guard helicopters practicing a deep swell water rescue. They dunked both choppers into the water. Amazing bit of flying."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYExH8hpgXI

 

Saw it on the news, they were busted and grounded for the stunt.

News report said they were on the way back from an air show and wanted to get each others pics but didn't know some tourist was filming it

 

X2 on that!

 

That was cool!

 

Damn tourists...

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/navy...dipping-incident-lake-tahoe/story?id=11722054

The Navy confirmed that two of its MH-60 Romeo helicopters appeared on the video.

The helicopters were returning to their home base at North Island in San Diego from an air show at Mather Air Force Base in Sacramento. They were supposed to be flying south via Lemoore Naval Air Station in central California, but the video showed them hovering over Lake Tahoe, which is 80 miles to the east of Sacramento and not a normal Navy training area.

Both helicopters sustained damage and made a landing at Lake Tahoe Airport, where the pilots reported the incident to their squadron. No one was injured in the incident.

 

I wonder how helicopter got damage? Water damage maybe?

And what part of it was in the water, the skids, the skids and part of the outer shell of the helicopter, what?


EDIT: Alright, after looking at it more, it looks like the body of the helicopter had contact with the water, crazy.

 

whatever they were doing it was not normal. they are lucky they didn't crash. I am a hh-60g crew chief in the air force, and i could almost guarentee that no branch of the military would ever pull a move like that. i have heard of h-53s and h-47s touching down in the water to pick up people in boats, but you would not be spinning out of control like that.

 

^This That kind of twist on a helo and then touching down on anything is looking for a dynamic rollover. The H-60 does not have an variants that I know of equipped for regular water landings...Emergencies are a different story.

That being said-Good on those guys for being able to fly out of that...

 

I crewed CH-53D's back in the early 90s in the USMC and I know for a fact that is bad juju to pull a stunt like that. Somebodys career went right down the crapper on this one!

 

The worst part is more than one of the pilots (on more than one aircraft!!) plus any members of the aircrew had to think this was an acceprtable thing to do. I think I would have to have thrown up the bullshit flag on this one.

 

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In the past, I have done some crazy things ... but to risk your whole crew doing a stunt like that (especially in a 60) is bad in my book.

FWIW ... Put their azz in "guns" aka a gunship, if they are bored and want thrills.

.

 

1) That's pretty sweet that they were confident enough to even attempt it.
2) Sucks to be them I'm sure seeing the man for something like that can't be fun
3) This will now be included in military OI's either as an option or as a "do not attempt"

 

so talking to my pilots the air crew said that they lost tail rotor authority which is why it went down and thats also what caused the bird to rotate like that.

 

That was definetly not intended or planned. The Romeo is a heavy SOB, throw altitude into the mix and this can happen. Can't remember what was stated in the hazrep, but they are damn lucky they didn't lose the aircraft.

 

All of which only makes those pilots choices that day that much worse. It's a known issue but they decided to play around anyways...
LTA is no joke and they are VERY lucky they flew outta that.