No, I'm all in favor of Morons--

However, I'm not in favor of the amazing people in SAR putting their lives on the line to recover the smears lefts on rocks that used to be these people. Living in WA, we have a lot of "really wants to kill you" wilderness here, including North Cascades Nat'l Park and Olympic Nat'l Park. Every single year, someone's predated body needs to be pulled out of the middle of one of these places by either a helo crew or the poor bastards who have to hike a bazillion miles to pack out what's left of Chuckles.

The number of SAR people who've died here is sobering. Every single one of them could have just walked away, but they went into danger's way to save people too stupid to save themselves. Sometimes their reward is to be spit on, like the ranger at Yellowstone who was berated by the father of a kid who dived into a hot spring after his dog (by "kid", I mean adult kid, not Timmy). The father wanted his kid's body recovered, no matter what. The ranger had to explain that the kid completely dissolved about five minutes after he fell in. The father then refused to speak to the ranger any further.

This shit doesn't happen in a vacuum. Someone's going to have to look at these human bird droppings and see that shit in their sleep for the rest of their lives.

Too bad they called it "Assault" - now folks think warfare. How about dropping in to tight spots in rescue situations? Or getting medical aid to stranded / injured folks in remote or inaccessible by foot locations - don't need to dispatch a helo, drive to the closest spot and fly in, render aid, wait on support/helo to lift you out. If I had one, it'd be for 1) party entrances and 2) scaring kids.

Helo

Correct, the landing should not be hard when done correctly. Also while you are correct that it is difficult to do correctly, we used to do them all the time in the military. That's what TRAINING is for. That said, there are plenty of difficult maneuvers done by military pilots routinely. Landing on an LPH or aircraft carrier for example (especially fixed wing with no hover capability). Also landing a helo in "the field" can be a challenge, landing in between trees, around obstacles, on top of obstacles, etc. All of which is done routinely in the military on a daily basis. Also low visibility, night flights, and instrument only flights can be a challenge. Flying over water at night in a helo is also challenging and dangerous.

I kind of disagree. Those stunt helos can accelerate to a blur and then make a complete dead stop in a fraction of a second. Given the usual "he who is less maneuverable has right of way" rule of thumb for everything not on wheels, I'd say the helo is at fault. Works for sail boats up to oil tankers...

http://videosift.com/video/Crazy-R-C-Helicopter-Skills

>> ^nach0s:

What is it with the heli chase overdub? The narrator was obviously not in the chopper or a part of the original newscast. My guess is that these videos are made without any audible sound, so to make it an interesting package, they get some hack who pretends he's either in the chopper or commenting on a live feed.


They re-dub the helo guy on America's Wildest Car Chases (or whatever it is they call it) to get around paying him a royalty.

>> ^Payback:

Upvote for the pilot of the helo at the end even though I'm not gonna say who it is, cuz, that would be like, a spoiler.


Dumb question, but it's a LOST reference right? "LOLZ!.....she's advanced to some future language!" had me cracking up. Thanks for cluing me onto the "hold on to your butts!" reference; I had no idea what that was all about until I watched a video about cochlear implants and then a video from Jurassic Park that included said "butts" reference.

Upvote for the pilot of the helo at the end even though I'm not gonna say who it is, cuz, that would be like, a spoiler.

I'm still with the protester here. The Attack helicopter might have gotten that one speeder but it cost the government more than $15 million....
By my simple calculations (leaving a few things out)

$250.00 (Speeding Ticket Income)
- [ $15,000,000(Helo) + $500,000(Tomahawk Missile)]
-------------------------------------------------------
(15,499,750) Government Loss

...they are going to have to catch a LOT more speeders.

Apparently the RC'er nor the cop at the end realized how completely crowded this airspace already is with low flying commercial helicopter operators. At one point he is about a half a mile from one of the busiest heliports in the country. All it takes is minor damage from a collision to the sensitive area of a helo's tail rotor and the results could be disastrous.

That being said, it's very cool indeed and I'm not even opposed to it over most cities, but NYC in particular has a crazy amount of (fairly fragile) sub-1000 feet helicopter traffic.

I don't see why they couldn't let you pilot the Helo, although I tend to agree with you that you wont be able to. More than 5 years ago I used to play BF2... You could pilot Jets as well as Attack & Transport Helicopters. It actually took a decent amount of skill to be a good pilot/gunner.

>> ^tsarsfield:

It's probably going to be used instead helicopters. They're cheaper and longer lasting than helos in terms of cost.


Helicopters are used because they can hover. The UAV that I saw in the video doesn't look like it was designed to hover...

It's probably going to be used instead helicopters. They're cheaper and longer lasting than helos in terms of cost.

The shots from the helo show some coordination; its a safe bet the captain knew about it. Surface Warfare Officers (the guys that run the ship) aren't known for their sense of humor, so it's cool to see this.

Orrite. Very cool.

However I do wonder what the point is over those little remote controlled helos.

I know wings are the only option at the scale of a fly, as the aerodynamic laws wont provide lift at that scale.

But I can buy a remote mini helo for $50 australian right now.