Tag Archives: helicopter

Marine Week

En route from a day with a client to the airport I had a spare hour to pay a visit to Boeing Field in Seattle. I figured that my time window would mean there was nothing much to see and I didn’t have anything longer than the 24-105 with me anyway. However, when I got there I could see an interesting collection of USMC machines on the opposite side of the field and the Blue Angels were parked up near the Museum of Flight.

I took a ride around to where the Marine helicopters and V-22 were parked and got chatting to one of the crews. He explained it was the start of Marine Week and offered a chance to walk around the ramp with one of the crew. I was not going to refuse that. Mario kindly showed me around and let me shoot anything external. They had three UH-1Y Venoms and three AH-1Z Cobras along with a single V-22. One fof the Cobras was marked up in special squadron colors. I took a walk around all of them and grabbed a few shots while chatting with Mario about what it was like to support these machines. He had worked on the UH-1N before converting to the Venom so he had some interesting perspectives on the relative reliability of the two.

These machines were going to be progressively moved across to the other side of the field as part of the public displays for Marine Week and the first of the Cobras actually was towed while I was there so my timing was excellent. However I did have to go and then my timing let me down as, while I was driving away, I saw an AV-8B Harrier II coming down the approach. Oh well. I still did better than I had expected.

Coast Guard Bell 47

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I always seem to find something aviation related when I am out and about. San Ramon is the next town up from us and it was having its Art and Wind event. This combined a bunch of art stalls with some excellent kite flying displays and was an amusing play on the more common Art and Wine festivals that many towns around here have. As we wandered around, we came across a Bell 47 helicopter. They are not terribly rare but this one was a bit more interesting as it was in service with the Coast Guard Auxiliary.

I had no idea that Bell 47s were still in government service. The crew were standing by and talking to a selection of kids that came to have a look. Our timing couldn’t have been better because just after we arrived, they starting moving people away so that they could take off. It would have been rude to leave at this point so we sat down close by and watched them start up and depart the field after a brief moment turned towards us to say goodbye. Nice!

Erickson Flashback

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I was recently looking back through a few of the previous posts and came across some images of Erickson Aircrane at work in Chicago with their S64 Skycranes. I was thinking about the various times I had worked with these guys and it occurred to me that several of those lifts had taken place before I started the blog. Therefore, today is a gratuitous chance to look at some older helicopter shots.

The guys at Erickson have carried out many lifts in the Chicago area. On one occasion, they did two lifts in one day on opposite sides of the city. The first was down near Hyde Park with some equipment being lifted onto a residential block. The loads were lifted in a park area in front of the building. Lots of trees were in this park and the Skycrane did an excellent job of finding the weakest and dead limbs. By the end of the job, the ground was covered in dead wood!

The second lift was in Oak Park and was from a garage structure up to the roof of the building. however, next to the garage was an older building with a wooden roof and balconies which had lots of stuff stored on them. After the morning, we were rather worried about how much stuff would be damaged. Amazingly, the gentle breeze from the street made the downdraft totally benign and the building was unharmed. Hope you like the shots.

Woohoo!

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I shall be a touch self-congratulatory here and celebrate something good that happened to me. Rotor Magazine held their annual photo contest and I entered a picture in the category Helicopters at Work. I am happy to say I won the category. The picture was in the edition of the magazine for Heli-Expo and was on show at the event itself. Many thanks to the guys at Midwest Helicopters. It was one of the shoots with them that the shot came from. I hope they are as glad as I am!

Shooting the Astar

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The team from Helinet was in town recently as part of a movie shoot. With the end of the shoot coming up, I was asked to get some shots of the helicopter in the city. Alan knows exactly what he is doing when flying in amongst the city buildings and can put the helicopter wherever I wanted it for the images. We even got lucky with some great weather. (The following day, it was foggy and no go at all!)

With some advance planning and some good communication during the shoot, we were able to position the helicopter to look dynamic in amongst the buildings. It would have been good to get some video too but time was limited and stills were required so that is what we did. A fun shoot and great people to work with.

Helicopter Over London

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My Dad’s 70^th birthday seemed like something that deserved a decent present. What to get him though? As someone who spent his entire working career in London property, he has seen all parts of the city many times. However, I know he hasn’t seen it from above so much. Therefore, a helicopter ride over the city seemed like a good idea. The fact that I thought it would be really cool too is neither here nor there!

I asked a friend of mine who flies helicopters who he would recommend for this and, being an outstandingly good fellow, he volunteered his services. A very generous gesture. Having someone I know flying the trip meant it was a lot easier to discuss exactly what we wanted to do.

The helicopter corridor across London runs along the River Thames. You join it at Greenwich to avoid the London City Airport airspace and then head along the river through the city and out to the west until you reach Fulham at which point you peel off to avoid Heathrow – always a good idea if they aren’t expecting you!

The weather was not quite what we had hoped. The day started very nicely but the haze built up as we went. Flying early was probably a good idea since it didn’t clear up again until the evening at which point the birthday party was underway. I saw a few buildings that have sprung up since I left including The Shard. I do love London and seeing it again from such a great vantage point was a lot of fun. I hope Dad enjoyed it as much as I did!

Flying Over Chicago

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One thing I have been thinking about for a while is doing a flight across Chicago in a helicopter. I had contemplated this on and off for a while but never got around to doing it. Then I got an offer that was impossible to pass up. Someone I have been working with on a couple of things was going to be doing some flying across the city on another project and asked if I wanted to ride along. Let me think about that for a second…

The day was not the best for photography sadly. The city was shrouded in low cloud with the tops of the taller buildings in the clouds. This didn’t harm the work they had planned but it did change the perspective on things a bit. However, the city was still there and I was still in a helicopter – one with an opening window no less – so time to make the most of it.

With our departure from the city not far in the future at this point, it really was a great time to get a view like this. I have been on plenty of tall buildings in the city working with the helicopter crews so I have seen some great sights but heading around the city to different spots gives you so much more of interest. I grabbed as many shots as I could while the guys got on with the reason for being there. They were great to fly with and a very professional crew. Thanks for taking me along.

Up Close and Personal with an Enstrom

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I was visiting a helicopter operator as part of an article that I am working on at the moment. Unconnected with the subject I was covering are some other operations that they undertake including some flying training activities. One of the customers was converting onto the Enstrom while I was there so I took the time to get some shots.

The Enstrom is a cute looking machine to my eye. The shape of the fuselage is emphasized by getting as close as you can to it. The best place to be was low and just off the pad. I was in a safe spot where I was and I knew the capabilities of those in control so was happy to get the shot. The hardest thing about shooting here is that the downwash is strong so holding steady is tricky.

When the sortie was over, they came back and taxied low across the site so I managed to grab a few more shots. What better way to spend time on a lovely sunny day?

Helinet and Transformers

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Every once in a while, I am reminded of something that has happened before and I realize that this took place in the days before I started blogging. Then I have to decide whether it is fair to you, my dedicated reader, to roll out something that is several years old as a blog post. If it is interesting enough, why not. Besides, my life is not always so interesting so getting material is a case of taking it when you have it.

The subject in this case is a helicopter. “no, surely not” I hear you cry. It’s not like I ever write about or photograph helicopters. This is true. Indeed, this helicopter was involved in filming in the city which, as some recent posts will show, is not a particularly new topic either. This film, though, was Transformers 3. The filming of Transformers was a big deal in the city. Major streets were shut for days at a time and set construction to make them look like they had been demolished was impressive. As I think about it, I should probably post some pictures of that too at some point (note to self…).

Alan Purwin of Helinet was the pilot for the helicopter used for filming. It was a Eurocopter Astar (Squirrel for those of you in the UK and Ecureuil for the French speakers). It had a large camera mount on the nose to hold the cinema camera. Until recently, it was relatively easy to tell movie shoots from TV shoots by the size of the mount. Now film cameras are being replaced with such digital powerhouses as the Reds, the mount sizes are no longer so obvious.

There was filming day and night (including people skydiving into the shots from other helicopters and, if memory serves, the Trump Tower) and some pretty dramatic explosions. The Astar would fly around the river a lot getting shots and sometimes the shots were of people on the buildings so it would be flying close to them. All of this was a treat for someone like me. Just watching it was great fun but I got some shots too.

The plan had been to write a piece on Helinet. However, Paramount were not keen on having anything come out until the movie was released (a year later!) so the article stumbled a little. Then, there was an accident on one of the sets out of the city in which a woman received terrible injuries and the whole production schedule changed and Alan headed off to other projects. It would be nice to follow that one up again at some point.

New Transformers Filming

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The new Transformers movie is currently filming in Chicago. Some aerial filming was recently scheduled and we got advanced notice since it was going to make things a little disrupted in the morning. They were opening three of the bridges along the river and a helicopter was running through at low level filming sequences.

The filming work was being carried out by Alan Purwin of Helinet. Often, when filming is underway, it is hard to get close and get anything recorded. Obviously, they don’t want people filming there own stuff. Also, they don’t want you appearing in the shot. Fortunately, I found a spot where they were happy for us to be and that gave us a view, even if it was a bit restricted.

I actually moved from my first spot. The helicopter was so low I could only just see the top of the rotor head as it passed. The second spot gave a more open view. Watching from that close was very impressive. It took a couple of hours since they had to open up and close down areas between passes. Watching them come in was easy but coming the other way was a bit of guesswork as the helicopter could be heard but only appeared suddenly. Still, another good chance to shoot helicopters in the city. Am I getting repetitive?

Here is some video I got too.