Post by Globexanter on Jul 11, 2016 17:12:51 GMT -5
The pilot began by rolling the throttle open to the indent starting position, squeezing the trigger switch on his collective shortly afterwards. Almost immediately the electric starter motor pushed itself into action, whining as the rotors slowly began to accelerate above the helicopter's fuselage. All of a sudden, the whining was replaced by a loud hissing noise, indicating that the fire had caught both of the turbines, causing the exhaust-gas temperature gauge's needle to rush past the red line as the rotors spun to a blur. As normal, the needle stayed in the danger zone for a couple of tense seconds before returning back to the green operating range. The pilot, quickly leaning out of his right seat, gave a quick thumbs-up to the crewman standing by the side of the launch pad carrying a fire-extinguisher, just in case a hot start happened. Pulling the door closed while quickly adjusting his helmet, the flight commander went about increasing the collective. After a few seconds, the sound of the rotors was suddenly replaced by that of a loud crash and a bright flash, followed by a surge of pressure from the helicopter's power-plant, shoving the pilots with an incredible force against the glass cockpit, the shock wave easily snapping their bones as easily as twigs-
After a heavy gasp for air while pulling itself up, the human shape, resembling some form of sack in it's sleeping bag, slowly relaxed as it forced itself to lay down as it slowly began to relax it's breathing. "F**k." was the word it groaned as it tried to release it's tensed up muscles, quickly checking it's watch as to see the early hour.
"Hey, you all right?" quietly pronounced a voice to the person's right, emanating from behind the thin sides of the two adjoining one-man tents.
"Just this d**ned hard ground, nothing to worry about." sleepily answered the original voice, letting silence return to the small patch of tents and night pass through the region.
As reveille sounded in the early morning, efforts were quickly taken to perform the necessary work before the strong humidity and heat began affecting the local Southern environment. By eleven o'clock it was usually too hot to bother doing anything out in the open sun. However, the unit in question being a combat helicopter regiment, staying out of the sun would be rather impossible for the crew members undergoing their final stages of training. As a part of their final verification, in order to gain the right to fly as a flight commander in the regiment, the rookie pilots were required to undergo a certain amount of time under the tutorship of the regimental IPs, or instructor-pilots. The training exercise also involved the associated group of troopers assigned to the helicopter unit, forming the air-assault regiment.
The camp sat on an empty field downwind of a large mountain chain somewhere between the larger cities of Zeyat and Toulouse. In the empty field sat two rows of ten EC725 Caracals, flanked by a section of two Gazelles and three Mi-17s. Underneath the nearby trees sat the troops belonging to the regiment, including the fifty pilots, forty-six crew chiefs and gunners and then the hundred odd new troops being trained in far smaller groups in order to acclimate them to the routine operations performed by the regiment.
While Sergeants went about mustering and keeping a close eye on the troops preparing themselves nearby, the pilots ambled about their helicopters, packing their small kit bags underneath some of the rear seats for those whom could. Among the group of fifty splitting themselves out towards the helicopters designated to their control, ten were just out of their first EAALAT formation period, a training session lasting over thirty months in which the future officer-pilots would rack up the necessary skills required to fly the helicopters associated to the Army. Most of them however were yet to be right seat qualified in the regiment's main transport helicopter, the EC725. In one of the large Caracals, marked AA-404 on it's tail boom, two pilots were sat on the cargo bay's floor in their green flight suits, the side doors being locked open. Inside of the bay, one of the helicopter's crewmen could be seen rummaging through the box of rations that had been loaded into a storage hole back at the airbase.
"Anatoly, any luck on that food yet?" asked one of the pilots, digging through a separate ration box as he pulled out several heating elements.
"Oui, Mon Capitaine. Four breakfast ensembles, although we're missing two sugar sachets." answered the crew chief, sitting back down next to the officer.
"It's not an issue, Mélia's gone off to try and trade an hors-d'oeuvre with the troopers for some." he answered, grinning.
"Even better!" came the answer as the helicopter's rookie pilot came around the tail rotor, carrying several sachets of sugar while proudly holding up several chocolate bars.
"Congratulations are in order, sous-lieutenant. I'll get the heat ready." responded the captain, placing the metal frames and heating blocks a meter or so away from the helicopter before allowing them to light up, placing several tins of water filled with coffee sachets inside of them as the remainder of the crew went about finding some breakfast biscuits and some edible bars.
After spending ten or so minutes carefully preparing and consuming their food, Captain Nikuli turned to the younger officer as she finished off the rest of some nougat.
"Not too tired to lead the pre-flight check I hope?"
"Of course, mon Capitaine." quickly answered the junior commander, brushing some crumbs from a cereal biscuit off of a napkin as she reached into the cargo bay/cockpit division wall and pulled out the helicopter's green maintenance book, carefully checking to see if the crew chief had marked any specific notes regarding the aircraft in question before flipping it shut and stashing it in the pocket at the rear of the center console.
Then, jumping down the cargo bay, she pushed herself under the ship as to push the fuel-drain valve, allowing a small amount of fuel to pour out of the ship and confirm that no water condensation had gotten into any of the tanks. Moving to the rear of the aircraft the tail rotor tie-down straps were then undone and removed, stashed in the helicopter's storage compartment before the two pilots went about climbing on top of the roof deck, with one on either side of the aircraft, as to check the rotor-hub, mast, transmission mounts and control rods. The control dampers, push-pull tubes, safety wires and stabilizer parts being correctly in place, the pilots then carefully checked for hairline cracks in the blade grips and blade-roots. Seeing none, they headed back down, continuing the exterior pre-flight check with the many engine parts and tubes visible under the maintenance covers.
After two dozen minutes spent carefully pouring over the external aspects of the EC725, the pilots lowered themselves into the cockpit chairs, the junior officer taking the right hand seat as she went about going through the start-up procedure checklist interrupted only by the crewmen attaching both of the pilots into their seats and taking the necessary time to hook up their helmets to the correct radio jacks. The IP sat next to her carefully observing her every movement before giving her the go-ahead to start up the engine and rotors. Following just about the same procedure that had caused distress the night before, the junior pilot allowed the rotors to pick up enough speed for takeoff.
"All right, good job." hissed the IP's voice through the helicopter's internal intercom that connected the two pilots "I got authorization to go about and takeoff early, how much time did you get on this type during your training?"
"Not really, mon Capitaine. I did most of my low-level training in the Cougar, we only did some instrument training in the Caracal."
"That's all right. Just remember that it's a bigger, faster and more powerful variant, that's all really. We've got some clearance around us, go ahead and lift her out of here. Head us out south of the mountain."
The junior pilot clicked the microphone trigger switch on the cyclic control stick once as to confirm the order while the crewmembers went about closing and securing the cargo doors. She began by gradually raising the collective all while starting to push against the right pedal in order to anticipate for the lift. As the helicopter was relatively empty, having no heavy cargo to drag upwards, a quick glance a the manifold pressure indicator showed that the required power necessary for takeoff was close to minimal in regards to the power-plants above the fuselage.
The aircraft became light on it's tires, lifting slightly as the pilot began to adjust the anti-torque by using the pedals as to counteract the roll. Bringing the collective a little higher, the aircraft began to slowly lift off of the ground while the pilot began keeping the aircraft stable, controlling the collective, pedals and cyclic stick simultaneously as to keep the Caracal precisely hovering at a meter over the ground. Turning the helicopter to the South, the pilot began pushing the cyclic forward as to pass into forward flight, raising the collective and pushing the torque pedals as to keep the aircraft from dropping. The helicopter, losing most of it's ground effect, began passing into effective translational lift as it's pilot kept raising the collective, gradually lifting the Caracal into the sky as it began heading in a south-bound direction away from the camp.
Following the IP's instructions, the junior pilot then took the helicopter on a Western flight path, heading in the direction of one of the many isolated plots of land reserved for training by the GNF across the years. After twenty-or-so minutes of flying, the Captain began putting the younger officer through the paces, silently and carefully observing multiple landings, takeoffs, and one forced autorotation. After several exercises confirming the pilot's flying skills Nikuli reached down to grab his own commands on the left side of the aircraft.
"I've got it."
"You've got it." quickly answered the junior officer, sitting back into her seat as she let the controls return to the IP.
"Right, I'm going to be signing you off as right-wing qualified when we get back to the base. You did great, keep it up." continued the Captain, turning to smile at his copilot while bringing the helicopter to a stable flight in direction of the unit's main base of operation.
"Thank-you, mon Capitaine." answered Mélia, grinning through the loud noise in the cockpit.
"It's true, you know." responded the IP, chuckling lightly as he quickly went about giving the helicopter a quick system's check.
"What's that?" asked the younger pilot, looking up from a flight map she'd unfolded from the right door's pocket.
"You're got the grin all right, the Gache trademark. That's one mark I wont be forgetting from all of those televised speeches that came on now and again. Was your family close to them?"
"Not really, communication was never a great skill among our lot." she answered, attempting to change the course of the conversation by working on the map.
"Neither was sanity by the looks of it. Which isn't a bad thing, ace." pressed the Captain as he brought the helicopter in to a slow landing as they approached the airbase, quickly communicating with the control tower from time to time. Shortly afterwards, having brought the helicopter to taxiing flight, the pilot slowly let her land on it's designated spot, turning off the engines as the crew chief and gunner went about immobilizing and securing the aircraft on the ground.
The rest of the unit having already arrived at the airfield, the two pilots quickly separated after having filled the on-board flight logs, the flight commander walking off to the operations tent in order to fill in the company's logbook on his own. After signing in the hours spent flying as a duo, he lead himself to the operational commander's officer, letting himself in through the thin wooden door.
"Major." he stated, saluting the CO whom sat quickly returning the officer's salute from behind his desk, returning to his arrangement of files.
"Welcome back, Captain. I take it from the fact that you're still in one piece that your little prodigy is performing well?" asked the Major, looking up from several dossiers spread out on his desk, "Please, take a seat."
"Thank-you, Major. And the sous-lieutenant is doing well, at this rate she'll be gliding through the night courses."
"Wonderful. How many have we got now? Five?" answered the Major, looking up from his stack of papers.
"Six now, Major. Four Lakota pilots and two Caracals. All of them at the top of their classes."
"It's a shame that we can't rope in some new pilots for the Mi-26 programs. Can't you just picture ninety men streaming out of the back of one of those..." started the Major, leaning back into his seat while chuckling.
"Streaming straight into their graves, courtesy of a well-placed machine gun position or surface-to-air missile? These aren't conscripts we're talking about here but special operatives, not cannon fodder Andrei." laughed Nikuli, glancing at some of the open folders on the desk.
"Very true, those did make for interesting days though." answered the Major, passing over one of the folders to his colleague, "I got you those passes for the extra simulator time, by the way."
"Any issues with the officers in control of the building?" asked Nikuli, retrieving the six laminated pass cards from the light brown folder.
"Not really. The Captain in charge of the systems was hesitant at first, a call from the Ministry soon sorted that out though. We're basing the operation as a Yutil Promoff training requirement, so it'll be necessary to use the simulators on the slightly odd hours, but there shouldn't be any leaks or major interruptions. Speaking of that, the Lieutenant in command of the building's security was part of my administrative staff for some time, so we'll have no issues with people barging in or complaining." smiled the Major, retrieving the now-empty folder and meticulously placing it inside of the draws to his side.
"Terrific. Do we actually know what this is all for yet though? There's only so much training you can give to people without explaining why they're not outside flying among their fellow pilots as a larger team." pressed the Captain, leaning in closer to the desk as he lowered his voice slightly.
"Do you really want me to give them a few words that you could relay in terms of advice?" asked Andrei, starting to smile lightly as he equally leaned in on his desk as his fellow officer nodded quickly, "Tell them to be ready for anything. There's no way to predict the kind of stuff these people throw up at the pilots. Last year, if we follow one rumor, it was a jungle operation where the humidity was so strong that hauling half of the aircraft's load was nearly impossible. The next rumor was that it was taking place close to a storm in a desert with aircraft suffering from technical difficulties. We don't even know if they stick the units together anymore, it's pure randomness and the only correct way to prepare for it is for the pilots to be prepared for everything."
The two men sat in silence for a short period of time, the Captain slowly leaning back into his chair, mumbling a form of thanks as he stood up to leave the Major's office as Andrei began to turn his chair to return to his computer.
"Oh, Rurik?" the higher ranking officer, quickly said, his eyes remaining steadily concentrated on the computer's screen before turning to observe his colleague whom stood with his hand on the door handle.
"There's a reason I'm having you do this and not any of the other regimental IPs I could've dragged into this. You've got two officers whom may just be some of the best young pilots we've seen in a while. Training has already taught them to cope and deal with the worst: all you have to do is make them thrive in the worst situations they could possibly dream of. You know that you can do it."
Captain Nikuli nodded, giving the Major a crisp salute before awaiting the appropriate response and letting himself out of the office. Silently cursing himself for even taking up his old friend's offer in the first place he began to walk through the now deserted hallways of the administrative section of the base, letting his years of duty on the base guide him automatically towards his bunk while he tried to concentrate his mind on how he was going to perform the task set upon him during the coming weeks and possibly months.
After a heavy gasp for air while pulling itself up, the human shape, resembling some form of sack in it's sleeping bag, slowly relaxed as it forced itself to lay down as it slowly began to relax it's breathing. "F**k." was the word it groaned as it tried to release it's tensed up muscles, quickly checking it's watch as to see the early hour.
"Hey, you all right?" quietly pronounced a voice to the person's right, emanating from behind the thin sides of the two adjoining one-man tents.
"Just this d**ned hard ground, nothing to worry about." sleepily answered the original voice, letting silence return to the small patch of tents and night pass through the region.
As reveille sounded in the early morning, efforts were quickly taken to perform the necessary work before the strong humidity and heat began affecting the local Southern environment. By eleven o'clock it was usually too hot to bother doing anything out in the open sun. However, the unit in question being a combat helicopter regiment, staying out of the sun would be rather impossible for the crew members undergoing their final stages of training. As a part of their final verification, in order to gain the right to fly as a flight commander in the regiment, the rookie pilots were required to undergo a certain amount of time under the tutorship of the regimental IPs, or instructor-pilots. The training exercise also involved the associated group of troopers assigned to the helicopter unit, forming the air-assault regiment.
The camp sat on an empty field downwind of a large mountain chain somewhere between the larger cities of Zeyat and Toulouse. In the empty field sat two rows of ten EC725 Caracals, flanked by a section of two Gazelles and three Mi-17s. Underneath the nearby trees sat the troops belonging to the regiment, including the fifty pilots, forty-six crew chiefs and gunners and then the hundred odd new troops being trained in far smaller groups in order to acclimate them to the routine operations performed by the regiment.
While Sergeants went about mustering and keeping a close eye on the troops preparing themselves nearby, the pilots ambled about their helicopters, packing their small kit bags underneath some of the rear seats for those whom could. Among the group of fifty splitting themselves out towards the helicopters designated to their control, ten were just out of their first EAALAT formation period, a training session lasting over thirty months in which the future officer-pilots would rack up the necessary skills required to fly the helicopters associated to the Army. Most of them however were yet to be right seat qualified in the regiment's main transport helicopter, the EC725. In one of the large Caracals, marked AA-404 on it's tail boom, two pilots were sat on the cargo bay's floor in their green flight suits, the side doors being locked open. Inside of the bay, one of the helicopter's crewmen could be seen rummaging through the box of rations that had been loaded into a storage hole back at the airbase.
"Anatoly, any luck on that food yet?" asked one of the pilots, digging through a separate ration box as he pulled out several heating elements.
"Oui, Mon Capitaine. Four breakfast ensembles, although we're missing two sugar sachets." answered the crew chief, sitting back down next to the officer.
"It's not an issue, Mélia's gone off to try and trade an hors-d'oeuvre with the troopers for some." he answered, grinning.
"Even better!" came the answer as the helicopter's rookie pilot came around the tail rotor, carrying several sachets of sugar while proudly holding up several chocolate bars.
"Congratulations are in order, sous-lieutenant. I'll get the heat ready." responded the captain, placing the metal frames and heating blocks a meter or so away from the helicopter before allowing them to light up, placing several tins of water filled with coffee sachets inside of them as the remainder of the crew went about finding some breakfast biscuits and some edible bars.
After spending ten or so minutes carefully preparing and consuming their food, Captain Nikuli turned to the younger officer as she finished off the rest of some nougat.
"Not too tired to lead the pre-flight check I hope?"
"Of course, mon Capitaine." quickly answered the junior commander, brushing some crumbs from a cereal biscuit off of a napkin as she reached into the cargo bay/cockpit division wall and pulled out the helicopter's green maintenance book, carefully checking to see if the crew chief had marked any specific notes regarding the aircraft in question before flipping it shut and stashing it in the pocket at the rear of the center console.
Then, jumping down the cargo bay, she pushed herself under the ship as to push the fuel-drain valve, allowing a small amount of fuel to pour out of the ship and confirm that no water condensation had gotten into any of the tanks. Moving to the rear of the aircraft the tail rotor tie-down straps were then undone and removed, stashed in the helicopter's storage compartment before the two pilots went about climbing on top of the roof deck, with one on either side of the aircraft, as to check the rotor-hub, mast, transmission mounts and control rods. The control dampers, push-pull tubes, safety wires and stabilizer parts being correctly in place, the pilots then carefully checked for hairline cracks in the blade grips and blade-roots. Seeing none, they headed back down, continuing the exterior pre-flight check with the many engine parts and tubes visible under the maintenance covers.
After two dozen minutes spent carefully pouring over the external aspects of the EC725, the pilots lowered themselves into the cockpit chairs, the junior officer taking the right hand seat as she went about going through the start-up procedure checklist interrupted only by the crewmen attaching both of the pilots into their seats and taking the necessary time to hook up their helmets to the correct radio jacks. The IP sat next to her carefully observing her every movement before giving her the go-ahead to start up the engine and rotors. Following just about the same procedure that had caused distress the night before, the junior pilot allowed the rotors to pick up enough speed for takeoff.
"All right, good job." hissed the IP's voice through the helicopter's internal intercom that connected the two pilots "I got authorization to go about and takeoff early, how much time did you get on this type during your training?"
"Not really, mon Capitaine. I did most of my low-level training in the Cougar, we only did some instrument training in the Caracal."
"That's all right. Just remember that it's a bigger, faster and more powerful variant, that's all really. We've got some clearance around us, go ahead and lift her out of here. Head us out south of the mountain."
The junior pilot clicked the microphone trigger switch on the cyclic control stick once as to confirm the order while the crewmembers went about closing and securing the cargo doors. She began by gradually raising the collective all while starting to push against the right pedal in order to anticipate for the lift. As the helicopter was relatively empty, having no heavy cargo to drag upwards, a quick glance a the manifold pressure indicator showed that the required power necessary for takeoff was close to minimal in regards to the power-plants above the fuselage.
The aircraft became light on it's tires, lifting slightly as the pilot began to adjust the anti-torque by using the pedals as to counteract the roll. Bringing the collective a little higher, the aircraft began to slowly lift off of the ground while the pilot began keeping the aircraft stable, controlling the collective, pedals and cyclic stick simultaneously as to keep the Caracal precisely hovering at a meter over the ground. Turning the helicopter to the South, the pilot began pushing the cyclic forward as to pass into forward flight, raising the collective and pushing the torque pedals as to keep the aircraft from dropping. The helicopter, losing most of it's ground effect, began passing into effective translational lift as it's pilot kept raising the collective, gradually lifting the Caracal into the sky as it began heading in a south-bound direction away from the camp.
Following the IP's instructions, the junior pilot then took the helicopter on a Western flight path, heading in the direction of one of the many isolated plots of land reserved for training by the GNF across the years. After twenty-or-so minutes of flying, the Captain began putting the younger officer through the paces, silently and carefully observing multiple landings, takeoffs, and one forced autorotation. After several exercises confirming the pilot's flying skills Nikuli reached down to grab his own commands on the left side of the aircraft.
"I've got it."
"You've got it." quickly answered the junior officer, sitting back into her seat as she let the controls return to the IP.
"Right, I'm going to be signing you off as right-wing qualified when we get back to the base. You did great, keep it up." continued the Captain, turning to smile at his copilot while bringing the helicopter to a stable flight in direction of the unit's main base of operation.
"Thank-you, mon Capitaine." answered Mélia, grinning through the loud noise in the cockpit.
"It's true, you know." responded the IP, chuckling lightly as he quickly went about giving the helicopter a quick system's check.
"What's that?" asked the younger pilot, looking up from a flight map she'd unfolded from the right door's pocket.
"You're got the grin all right, the Gache trademark. That's one mark I wont be forgetting from all of those televised speeches that came on now and again. Was your family close to them?"
"Not really, communication was never a great skill among our lot." she answered, attempting to change the course of the conversation by working on the map.
"Neither was sanity by the looks of it. Which isn't a bad thing, ace." pressed the Captain as he brought the helicopter in to a slow landing as they approached the airbase, quickly communicating with the control tower from time to time. Shortly afterwards, having brought the helicopter to taxiing flight, the pilot slowly let her land on it's designated spot, turning off the engines as the crew chief and gunner went about immobilizing and securing the aircraft on the ground.
The rest of the unit having already arrived at the airfield, the two pilots quickly separated after having filled the on-board flight logs, the flight commander walking off to the operations tent in order to fill in the company's logbook on his own. After signing in the hours spent flying as a duo, he lead himself to the operational commander's officer, letting himself in through the thin wooden door.
"Major." he stated, saluting the CO whom sat quickly returning the officer's salute from behind his desk, returning to his arrangement of files.
"Welcome back, Captain. I take it from the fact that you're still in one piece that your little prodigy is performing well?" asked the Major, looking up from several dossiers spread out on his desk, "Please, take a seat."
"Thank-you, Major. And the sous-lieutenant is doing well, at this rate she'll be gliding through the night courses."
"Wonderful. How many have we got now? Five?" answered the Major, looking up from his stack of papers.
"Six now, Major. Four Lakota pilots and two Caracals. All of them at the top of their classes."
"It's a shame that we can't rope in some new pilots for the Mi-26 programs. Can't you just picture ninety men streaming out of the back of one of those..." started the Major, leaning back into his seat while chuckling.
"Streaming straight into their graves, courtesy of a well-placed machine gun position or surface-to-air missile? These aren't conscripts we're talking about here but special operatives, not cannon fodder Andrei." laughed Nikuli, glancing at some of the open folders on the desk.
"Very true, those did make for interesting days though." answered the Major, passing over one of the folders to his colleague, "I got you those passes for the extra simulator time, by the way."
"Any issues with the officers in control of the building?" asked Nikuli, retrieving the six laminated pass cards from the light brown folder.
"Not really. The Captain in charge of the systems was hesitant at first, a call from the Ministry soon sorted that out though. We're basing the operation as a Yutil Promoff training requirement, so it'll be necessary to use the simulators on the slightly odd hours, but there shouldn't be any leaks or major interruptions. Speaking of that, the Lieutenant in command of the building's security was part of my administrative staff for some time, so we'll have no issues with people barging in or complaining." smiled the Major, retrieving the now-empty folder and meticulously placing it inside of the draws to his side.
"Terrific. Do we actually know what this is all for yet though? There's only so much training you can give to people without explaining why they're not outside flying among their fellow pilots as a larger team." pressed the Captain, leaning in closer to the desk as he lowered his voice slightly.
"Do you really want me to give them a few words that you could relay in terms of advice?" asked Andrei, starting to smile lightly as he equally leaned in on his desk as his fellow officer nodded quickly, "Tell them to be ready for anything. There's no way to predict the kind of stuff these people throw up at the pilots. Last year, if we follow one rumor, it was a jungle operation where the humidity was so strong that hauling half of the aircraft's load was nearly impossible. The next rumor was that it was taking place close to a storm in a desert with aircraft suffering from technical difficulties. We don't even know if they stick the units together anymore, it's pure randomness and the only correct way to prepare for it is for the pilots to be prepared for everything."
The two men sat in silence for a short period of time, the Captain slowly leaning back into his chair, mumbling a form of thanks as he stood up to leave the Major's office as Andrei began to turn his chair to return to his computer.
"Oh, Rurik?" the higher ranking officer, quickly said, his eyes remaining steadily concentrated on the computer's screen before turning to observe his colleague whom stood with his hand on the door handle.
"There's a reason I'm having you do this and not any of the other regimental IPs I could've dragged into this. You've got two officers whom may just be some of the best young pilots we've seen in a while. Training has already taught them to cope and deal with the worst: all you have to do is make them thrive in the worst situations they could possibly dream of. You know that you can do it."
Captain Nikuli nodded, giving the Major a crisp salute before awaiting the appropriate response and letting himself out of the office. Silently cursing himself for even taking up his old friend's offer in the first place he began to walk through the now deserted hallways of the administrative section of the base, letting his years of duty on the base guide him automatically towards his bunk while he tried to concentrate his mind on how he was going to perform the task set upon him during the coming weeks and possibly months.