Drones Explained ......

So ... we hear lots of talk about drones, what are they, what do they do and how can I get trained on flying and advice on purchasing a drone.

Right now drones are not available for commercial use, 5 waivers have been granted to professional film companies for the use of drones. If you advertise the use of a drone for commercial use then the FAA may pay you a visit, even more important if you fly a drone in controlled airspace !

You want to look at www.skyvector.com to see if you are in the surface area of class B,C or D airspace, flying in this controlled airspace would be a federal matter. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED !

As an EMS pilot and check airman I regularly see articles on drones delaying the arrival and departure of EMS helicopters, if one of these drones ended up in the intake of a turbine engine it would destroy the engine and maybe cause a fatal accident.

So on to the drones ....

We at Blue hill helicopters will be offering a training course on the use and regulations relating to drones in an attempt to educate people on when and where to fly them and buy them, many people buy the drone they see at the local hobby store without researching future upgrade options etc.

Drones come in several shapes and sizes, acrobatic drones and camera platform drones for personal use video footage. The best drone right now for use in acrobatic and fun flying would be the BLADE 350 QX , a great flying drone with lots of modes for the new pilot, if you want to just fly around then this would be the way to go .

The next drone to consider would be a drone for a camera platform, to obtain shots like in the video in this blog. Without a doubt the best drone in this market would be the DJI Phantom 2 , this is s great start and we will talk about what you need to add to this drone to get amazing HD footage.
DO NOT BUY the Phantom vision , it has a very poor camera and is not upgradeable.

First of all you need a platform that is upgradeable as technology improves, we know how fast cameras improve and already we are seeing the Go Pro 4 out on the 5th of October !  the phantom 2 is the best choice . Now we need to add a camera, its a no brainer that the Go Pro is the best camera on the market but get the BLACK edition , it has some higher frame rate options for making slow mo videos .

How do we keep this camera stable whilst we are buzzing through the air ? we need a gyro gimble . The best gimble to get would be the H3 3D, it works perfectly with the Go Pro and powers it from the drone so no fear of the battery going dead !

Now we have 

The Drone - The DJI Phantom 2 

The Gimble - The H3 3D

The Camera - The Go Pro (Black edition)

We can now fly our drone and take great HD video ...... but wait ! we can only fly it where we can see it unless we add some more options . How about a live video feed so that we can see from the eyes of our drone and fly it up to a mile away ? There are many options here and here is where you can make some big mistakes . We need a transmitter to add to our drone and a GPS interface so that we can feed back information from our drone to our screen attached to our remote control. The only way to do this is by taking our drone apart and connecting the required modules (some soldering required).

What we need for the FPV set up (First person view)

GPS Module - DJI phantom GPS module

Radio transmitter and antenna  - Boscam TS 832 , 5.8 Ghz TX 

Monitor screen and receiver  - 7 inch monitor with built in 5.8 Ghz  RX

Bracket to mount to the drone controller.

So this is the complete setup and very upgradeable, lots of options for future transmitter upgrades etc.

Here is a finished video 

Another Instrument pilot !

Blue Hill Helicopters would like to congratulate Jeremy Jankowski on receiving his helicopter instrument rating.

There are a few milestones in an aviation career in helicopters.  Your first time in a stable hover.  First solo flight.  The day you pass that first check ride.  Everybody can remember them like it was yesterday.  For a flight instructor, it's the day your first student passes his or her check ride.  Not only is it a "look at 'em go" moment, it's affirmation of the course you've chosen to steer.

Permit a brief digression, if you please.  Remember the first car you wanted?  The one with the powerful engine, flashy paint job, and bucket seat for someone attractive alongside?  If you're like me, that is not the car you got.  Most of us got something dependable and safe.  The car our mothers would have picked out on our behalf.

If Mom could have picked my first student, she would have chosen Jeremy.  Talk about stacking the deck-this guy brought every advantage to the table.  A 7,500 hour fixed wing pilot with his ATP airplane and private helicopter ratings.  15 years of experience in the industry.  Willing to study hard, patient, a great fund of jokes, and let's face it- a very skilled pilot. Jeremy emailed us from Connecticut and from the beginning, you knew he was serious.  He knew he needed 15 hours to complete his instrument add-on and with the 2 hour drive, he was going to be here all day when he had time off.  Jeremy was looking for a Sikorsky 300 instrument trainer and a simulator.

Blue Hill was the perfect place for Jeremy to finish his rating in just a few visits on his days off- over the holidays no less.  He was prepared every time and brought a great attitude to his flying that was infectious to be around.  He easily skated through his check ride with our Designated Examiner, Mr. Don Cody.  (We're lucky to have him do the majority of our practical tests but he deserves his own post.  More later.)  In fact, as he packed up his things to leave after issuing Jeremy his new rating, Don summarized Jeremy's time here in the phrase, "It has been a pleasure flying with you."  Well said.




We will certainly try and post more this winter .. its not the lack of things going on but more the fact that we don't have time !!


 Th BHH Team !

Merry Christmas from Blue Hill Helicopters !

As another year is almost over, we would like to thank all of our students and friends for flying with us this year ! It has been a great year with the addition of an R44 and a new Schweizer .

Congratulations to anybody who got a new rating this year, and good luck to those who will be getting ratings in the new year. We are hoping 2014 to be as good as 2013, it wont be long before we are flying with the doors off again !

Merry Christmas and a Happy new year !

They have way more fun at school in the USA !

Growing up in England , I was not lucky enough to experience the school system in the USA , I still have no idea what a sophomore is ! Video cameras consisted of a shoulder mounted device with a VHS tape recorder in a bag, the whole device could not be carried for long and we have better quality in a car reversing camera !

When Foxborough High school asked us if we donate some helicopter time for a high school 'lip dub' project we could not say no !

Johann landed at the school to a group of very happy students and took to the skies to film the closing segment of the video, the day could not have worked out better and we were certainly very happy to help!

Thanks for great publicity FHS !

FHS "Lip Dub" video


The 'Lip Dub' story

Kelly, another great cross country completed.

Kelly is a business owner and has been interested in helicopters since she was a child. She tried a few lessons a few years ago in airplanes but never kept up with the training. She finally decided to start her life long dream of helicopter flying and once she started she was hooked ! Kelly has a high stress job running a large security company and loves the stress relief of flying a helicopter. She recently completed her cross country and is moving into the last stage of her training with confined areas and advanced auto's. Kelly will soon be taking the private check-ride and taking her friends for rides ! well done Kelly

 

Anderson did it and got the T shirt !

Anderson finally soloed ! Anderson lives on the vineyard and makes the trip weekly to BHH. His business has been very busy and he has not been able to come every week to train with us. Anderson worked very hard and made time to sit down and get in the books, he soon found found himself on the runway with his instructor stepping out and sending him off on his first solo ! well done Anderson , you got the T shirt !

The fastest solo ever !

Brandon Williams came to BHH to get his ratings FAST !  He worked hard with Johann and was ready to solo the aircraft at 8 hours ..... when we say ready we mean ready ! With the Schweizer for primary training there are no restrictions like the R22, you must have 20 plus hours to solo in the Robinson, holding students back. Brandon eventually soloed the Schweizer at 11 hours , yes 11 ! He is currently cruising through 25 with all his cross country time completed, now find another school that can do that !
Brandon is on our 141 program so he can obtain a private rating at 35 hours , we are the only Part 141 helicopter school in the area.

No Excuse for not blogging !

Its been several months since we have shared the activities at Blue Hill Helicopters ! Its not for the lack of training but more the lack of time to blog . We are going to make several entries and try to bring everyone up to speed on what is happening and try to mention everybody who has achieved a goal at Blue Hill Helicopters over the last few months .

Carlos, one of our Brazilian connection has been working very hard on his CFI after completing all his other ratings, he should be finished soon and will be flying as an instructor with Blue Hill Helicopters and working with all our Portuguese speaking  students. If you are Brazilian and would like to work with a Portuguese speaking instructor then come down and meet Carlos, He is both a commercial airplane and helicopter pilot and soon to be a CFII in both . Keep up the good work Carlos !

The truth about tubine transitions revealed...........

If you started training to be a helicopter pilot to someday make it a job, please read on !
Very early in your training you start to hear talk about turbine engine helicopters like they are some some of mystical machine that are only operated by pilots with 100,000 hours ... not true, they still have a collective and a cyclic and even pedals ! Some have other gadgets that actually make it easier for you to fly. I can speak as a pilot who flies several different types of turbine helicopters commercially in the gulf of mexico and will explain a little more about making the transition to turbine helicopters .

There is no doubt that you will teach in small piston helicopters like the schweizer or (if you have to) then the R22. You will teach private commercial and instrument students the same things that you learned about for probably 1500 hours . This number changes on the industry standards and the demand for pilots increases or decreases year by year . Right now there is no doubt that the industry requires 1500-2000 to be considered for maybe a tour job or power line patrol, these jobs are generally with a company like liberty helicopters in NY City or one of the Las vegas tour operators like Sundance or Papillon. The Vegas operators normally hire in December and start looking for pilots at the heli-success  job fair in Vegas, Liberty seems to be a closed door and unless you know somebody it can be hard to get in but not impossible. One of my best friends and an old instructor at Blue Hill,  'Mark Musgrove' landed a job with liberty several years ago with only 1200 hours....to prove a point he had no turbine experience and had been teaching with Blue Hill for almost a year in a piston engined schweizer. He built 800 hours of turbine experience in the Astar (AS350) and moved over to an EMS job when the NY tour season ended and gaining a transistion to the EC135 multi engine  helicopter with Air methods.

Many of our current students will know 'Adrian Mansfield' a long term instructor at Blue Hill who got himself a job flying tours for Papillon in Las Vegas at the start of the tour season this year. To prove another point Adrian had 0 turbine hours but almost 2000 of piston time again teaching in the schweizer. I guess my point here is 'DO NOT pay for turbine time ..... if you can get in it for free then go ahead of course but never pay for it !

Factory courses
A factory course can be of use, but real factory courses like the "Eurocopter" factory course or the "Bell" factory course are expensive and run upwards of $8k plus travel etc. Insurance companies will only except the actual factory course , don't be fooled by a flight school offering you a 'turbine transition' in an old Bell 206 , there is no such thing as a turbine transition .................. Do car dealers offer a transition into there vehicle when you buy it ? NO ! this is the best way to look at it .

When you get hired
When you get hired on by a tour operator they will train you... and for free ! in whatever type of helicopter they want you to fly, they will also train you the way they want you to fly it. Not to beat a dead horse but both Adrian and Mark were instructors that were hired with 0 turbine time.

The GOM
A little about the gulf of mexico.... The gulf has always been a place for pilots to build some good time and get transitioned to some pretty complex helicopters, there are stories of pilots getting hired with no turbine experience and only 1500 hours , its changed a little these days and it seems the operators are now looking for 2000 plus some turbine experience, its a love or hate environment with long hours and being away from the comfort of home for 2 weeks at a time called a 'Hitch'. If you put the time in here it can pay off with transitions with the non-union operators coming quickly .

Housing is generally at a remote heliport in a trailer just a couple of hundred feet away from the helicopter but comfortable, maintenance is good  and the flying is varied with most days being different, unlike tours where the same route is flown everyday just with different people.

So the purpose of the blog ... Don't pay for transitions into turbines !


BHH







 

Rick did it !

Rick Venditti came to Blue Hill Helicopters this summer in the hopes of learning to fly a helicopter , we told Rick  he had certainly come to the right place !

On August 19th Rick completed his first solo in the schweizer, with no limitations he took the solid little training helicopter around the pattern for a few laps . Ricks next trip out will be solo from the ramp with no help from his instructor Kilian.

 Good luck and well done Rick !

Solo !

Hugh joined Blue Hill Helicopters after one of our open houses, he has worked hard to get to a solo standard and on August 15th he did it !

Well done Hugh, now you can continue on to the next level of  solo cross country !

Some questions to ask your flight school !

So..... you decide that you want to go to flight school, you did your research and chose your school . The school seemed friendly and they had good equipment . The instructors explained the courses and you found yourself working your way through the private license.

BUT WAIT ! Do they have an instructor with the experience to do the touchdown autos required for the CFI ? yet again does that instructor have the requirements to be able to sign you off for a CFI check ride ? This requires 24 months as a flight instructor and 200 hours of flight instruction given as a minimum, many instructors do not have the experience to do this and many schools bring in outside instructors just to do this , this can really disrupt the flow for the student.

Blue Hill Helicopters has several instructors on staff to take you through the CFI. We can safely complete your CFI rating without bringing in outside contractors.

Our newest instructor "Johann Sweitzer" has been in several blogs already, this month he completed the CFI and moved on to a job with Blue Hill Helicopters ! Johann trained exclusively from start to finish with Blue Hill and finally he gets to sit in the left seat and teach , Well done Johann .

May was the month of checkrides !

What a great month at Blue Hill, Check rides and solo's. With awesome weather we were able to fly 7 days a week and get people finished up quickly. It started with Carlos Almirani getting his Helicopter Add-on on May 24th. Carlos is already a commercial fixed wing pilot and wanted the benefits of simulator to cover some of his hour requirements. Carlos went solo very early in his training and unlike the Robinson with a 20 hour solo minimum the schweizer 300Cbi did not hold him back. Well done Carlos, already on to Instrument and commercial and then CFI.

 

All you need to do now Carlos is loose the flip flops for flying ! 

John Doris

Next up we have the young John Doris who went solo on May 25th, he is only 18 years old and already has a fixed wing rating, John has some great talent and again went solo very early with no hold backs for minimum solo that you need to meet with the Robinson, like Carlos he chose Blue Hill Helicopters over several Robinson schools in the area and never looked back. John is off to Florida to study aviation management in August so wants to finish the private before he has to leave.

 

Here is John with Kilian, although we are unsure why Kilian is wearing a hoodie on an 80 degree day ! Kilian you are the best !

Johann Sweitzer 

Johann has been at Blue Hill for a while and on May 29th he passed his Commercial Helicopter check ride. Johann has completed all his ratings at Blue Hill helicopters and has become part of the team. Johann is always around the school and is the technical expert on our Fly-IT simulator. He is glad to have the Commercial out of the way and get the CFI and CFII finished. He can then begin his teaching career at Blue Hill ! 

Johann is 26 and this is the only girlfriend he has right now :-( 

Call Blue Hill Helicopters for his details !!

Josh Haddad

Josh started with Blue Hill Helicopters several years ago before he moved away to the west coast, he completed all his ratings there and came back to MA recently to complete his CFII with Blue Hill Helicopters. We can safely say he 'aced' the check ride and finally added that all important CFII on  June 18th. The instrument rating is the most important rating in the helicopter world and to teach it you need a CFII. Well done Josh !

 

Keep checking back for updates on www.BlueHillHelicopters.com , we will have our next open house in August along with the yearly school barbecue for current students . Have a great week and remember we have great deals on flight training even with fuel costing more than gold !

BHH

Commercial Pilot and Open House

Again its been a month since we took the time to blog, Part 141 Re-Approval took a lot of our time and is now fully complete with the only approved simulator course in the north east. With other flight schools losing approval due to lack of experience to maintain a chief pilot or zero graduations.....
.
Summer is trying to arrive and we are busier than last year, maybe that's a good sign that the economy is improving and people are again thinking about having fun !

Francisco has been a student for some time at BHH, He does not fly often but has been a solid student and always studied hard. Francisco balances a full time Job as TSA agent and his shift allows him to receive flight training on weekdays.

After obtaining his Private and Instrument ratings with BHH he took his Commercial check ride this week and passed first time, Well done Francisco !!! He will move on to his CFI next week .

Don't forget we have an open house this Saturday the 28th at the BHH office, 125 Access road, Norwood MA 02062. We will have sandwiches, drinks and our Simulator here for people to view. We will be talking about how to obtain ratings and save money in your training.

See you there !

More to come........

BHH

More Solo's !

A while ago we mentioned Scott Gannon completing his first solo in the Schweizer or Sikorsky 300 as it is now known. We did not have pictures at the time but finally they are here !.

Scott is the perfect student, he always studies and arrives on time. Scott has been a super fast learner and I am sure will make the perfect instructor when he is finished.

Scott got his solo done in very low time, unlike the Robinson Helicopters there is no restriction on when a student can complete their first solo flight, so if your a fast learner like Scott you can save some time.

Scott is completing his solo cross countries right now and will soon be on to the all important checkride !

Congratulations Scott and have a great day !


The BHH Team

An example to us all.......

Adrian Mansfield started with Blue hill helicopters almost three years ago, We were looking for an instructor and I called Adrian. He was down in Florida at the time after just completing his training at Bristow Academy, the biggest civilian school in the world with over 50 Schweizer helicopters.

Adrian and I arranged a date and he came up for a two day interview, I collected him from the airport and we headed to the school, chatting about England on the way and how I did not miss it and he did !

We went over some ground school in the classroom and Adrian did great , we flew and I knew at that point he would be teaching at Blue Hill. Adrian and I arranged a date for him to start and he made the drive from Florida a week later and to my house until he found a place to live. Adrian fitted in well and soon built some great relationships with the students and myself, although we butted heads at times ! Many people have moved through the school under Adrians careful guidance and received licenses from Private through CFII.

Here we are three years and 1800 hours later in Adrians logbook and he is more than ready to move on to his next adventure. We would love to keep all of our instructors forever but they must all move on to the next stage, thats why we teach. Adrian will be making the trip to Las Vegas to fly tours in the Grand Canyon and the las vegas strip. He will be flying the EC130 initially then the AS350, I am sure he will impress and help more of our CFII's to move on to the next level.

I can honestly say that I am proud that one of our instructors has again been hired into the industry, It says a lot for the school and the standards and reputation we keep, we will keep you updated on Adrians progress in Las Vegas !!!!

Steve 

Solo pilots and fresh 141 simulator courses approved !

Firstly, we must apologize for lack of blogs, recent weeks have been taken up writing new simulator inclusive courses for our fresh part 141 school approval, these will be approved for use at the end of the month !  January has seen several new student pilots and some are solo already !, Firstly Scott Gannon soloed in the schweizer and closely followed by Carlos Almirani this weekend. Scott has moved right along and already completed some of his required cross country work. Unlike the Robinson helicopter , the schweizer has no restriction on hours when a student can solo, so you wont be held back if you are talented ! Carlos was already a fixed wing commercial pilot with tail wheel and aerobatic experience under his belt, he showed his skill with three perfect patterns under Kilian's supervision on the runway.

Congrats Carlos and Scott, We promise to update you all with the latest on the fresh 141 approval and the inclusion of the sim in the programs to save you money !

The BHH Team

Santa is real for the non-believers !

Yes its true, Santa Claus is real ! we know this because he was in our offices at the Norwood airport!

Santa was here on a mission .... He needed a helicopter to drop gifts off in the local area , sometimes he needs to make early deliveries to people who wont be around on Christmas day!

Santa is also very very good with making things with baloons and he even made the instructors at BHH a baloon helicopter!

Santa had a safe flight and delivered many gifts from the air. We were lucky that the Schweizer helicopter is able to carry a lot of weight so we could carry santa and his gifts!

Merry Christmas from everyone at BHH and thanks to all of our friends who are also our customers, good luck in 2012.

The British school of Boston

Thirty one children greeted us on Thursday morning, yes 31 ! They arrived in two minibuses from The British school of Boston.

Martyn Langley called us several weeks back about a project that the children were doing on airports, they had been working on how airports operate and how aircraft fly. We decided that a visit to the airport would be great for the children and they would be able to get up close to the helicopters and a private citation jet .

They arrived at 9.30am and we split them into three groups , the first group went over to the jet and were amazed at just how big it was ! They took turns at sitting inside and pretending to be rock stars ,well the teachers did anyway !

We showed everybody the Helicopters and they had fun pressing buttons and talking to each other on the intercom in the helicopters. Thanks to Kilian, Adrian and Johann for the help in keeping things from getting broken !

It was an amazing sight seeing thirty one children sat on the floor in the offices eating lunch ! We gave them all pens and keyrings and they went back to the British school to talk about what they had seen !

More blogs to come , plenty going on here at Blue Hill Helicopters including a first solo from Scott Gannon , Great job Scott , as soon as we have the pictures we will Blog about your journey to going solo !

We would also like to welcome our new edition to the team Kilian Szulmirski, he joins us from Germany and will be one of the new CFII's here at BHH. Welcome Kilian.

Happy holidays everyone and dont forget it is not to late to get a gift certificate for christmas. We can send gift certificates for helicopter flights or for the simulator .

All at BHH

Johann sweitzer Instrument pilot !

Once again Blue hill helicopters reports a check ride pass! Johann started with BHH and completed his private then moved on to instrument . He passed his Instrument check ride on Friday and is keen to start on the commercial program ASAP !

Johann completed 15 hours of his requirements in our FLY-IT simulator . Saving him time and money and allowing him to fly in any weather ! and we have had some bad weather the last couple of months !

On this occasion Johann used the Schweizer C model for his flight test but the simulator is approved to complete the instrument check ride in. Johann has been ready for the check ride now for several weeks but with scheduling conflicts and weather he could not complete it until Friday. He was however able to maintain his ability with regular sessions in the simulator and aced the check ride.

BHH is now offering contract positions for the use of our simulator and the first regular user will be announced in the next few weeks, a very large helicopter operator indeed !

Keep checking our blog for the latest news and events from BHH , several students are getting ready to solo in the next couple of weeks !