Honestly when I first saw the headline I thought that it was one of Snowbird/Powderbird's Helicopters that went down. This season we have seen a lot of them flying around.
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Helicopter Crash Closes Snowbird's Mineral Basin
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Kingslug20
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Someone..has a lot of explaining to do..
Newpylong
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Yeah, like any accident...
Kingslug20
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This is a bit more..than just any accident..
Newpylong
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Is it?
Kingslug20
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Oy.
2 black hawk helicopters..collide and fall into mineral basin...
Pretty wild..
2 black hawk helicopters..collide and fall into mineral basin...
Pretty wild..
jimk
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Going up to Snowbird momentarily. They are getting fresh snow. Will report back.
Dickc
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One had an "incident" landing, and part of its main rotor took the tail rotor off of number 2 according to the news.
jimk
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Mineral Basin was sporadically open today, and seemed continually open after about noon. They must have the accident scene squared away. Visibility was not great today and I never went back into Mineral myself.
Mineral Basin is to the left and summit restaurant is upper center in this photo I took today at mid-day. Good snow conditions, but not good flying weather.
Mineral Basin is to the left and summit restaurant is upper center in this photo I took today at mid-day. Good snow conditions, but not good flying weather.
mister moose
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Where are the reports of a collision coming from? The videos I saw showed a fair bit of separation of the two helicopters until the snow cloud obscured both.
It's entirely possible that when going from visual flying to ground obscuration in the blowing snow, spatial disorientation resulted. Rotor strike, go boom. Helicopters react very poorly to rotor strikes. Both looked like very stable approaches prior to the snow cloud.
There are several prescribed MOA (Military Operation Area) airspace corridors in both Vermont and Upstate NY. They train there regularly.
It's entirely possible that when going from visual flying to ground obscuration in the blowing snow, spatial disorientation resulted. Rotor strike, go boom. Helicopters react very poorly to rotor strikes. Both looked like very stable approaches prior to the snow cloud.
There are several prescribed MOA (Military Operation Area) airspace corridors in both Vermont and Upstate NY. They train there regularly.
jimk
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I think a piece of broken main rotor from one helo hit and damaged the tail rotor of the other helo.
machski
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If the Utah unit is anything like the NH Guard unit, they are likely the mountain search and rescue arm for Utah. It would not surprise me if below the Mineral Basin lifts is a staging point for rescue ops for them, so landing there normally might not be far fetched. The accident will surely be investigated. The NH guard does the high presidential extractions often and trains landing on Mount Washington fairly routinely.
kendo
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Utah NG said they were training for landing in whiteout conditions. 1st hovers to create the conditions for the 2nd (trailing) to land in. In the video, the 1st is stable at tree level (creating the whiteout) while the 2nd becomes obscured and has the rotor failure.
Will extract both via Chinook...
www.ksl.com
Will extract both via Chinook...
Black Hawk crash site in Mineral Basin secured until helicopters can be removed
A team is traveling to Utah to conduct a safety investigation into Tuesday's training accident that involved two Black Hawk helicopters from the Utah Army National Guard.
www.ksl.com
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BenedictGomez
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Quite a few times I've seen fighter jets while skiing Stowe.
BenedictGomez
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Especially at treetop level. This dude's one helluva pilot (and/or crazy).
EDIT: Second video. Not sure why 1st tweet's also pulling in.
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jimk
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I took this photo at about noon today 24 Feb 2022. They haven't removed the helo debris yet.
BenedictGomez
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That mid-week lift line though.
Kingslug20
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They fly over my house all day
ss20
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That's Mineral Basin on any clear day. Bet Peruvian was ski-on or close to it.
A lot of extra aerial activity today at Alta. Helicopters are super common but more than usual and a sonic jet overhead (2nd time this season). ASSuming Ukraine/Russia conflict may have something to do with it, if anything just creating a larger presence on radar for Putin to see.
Hill AFB is one of a handful with the new F35's.
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