What happens when a helicopter suffers an engine failure?

Question

What happens when a helicopter suffers an engine failure?

Answer

A helicopter is a very complex machine both mechanically and aerodynamically. The term you are asking about is called “auto rotation”. A helicopter is very capable of landing with no engines running, provided the correct procedures are followed.

At normal flight, the rotor (The main part of the lift generating mechanical “propeller”) sucks air through the rotor-disc, using aerodynamics just as any other propeller, generating a lift force downwards and thus creating the necessary forces for the helicopter to “lift off”. During an engine failure the air that is now generated by speed and gravity pass the other way, that is up through the rotor-disc and makes it able to perform a glide while the rotors are still turning.

A helicopter in autorotation will drop at about 2000-3000 feet per minute. At about 200 feet above the chosen landing spot, you will initiate what we call a “flare” to reduce this decent. By pulling up the nose and expending the forces in the rotation of the rotor-disc, you can make a quite soft landing.

Here is a link you can read more about it, and I am sure there are many videos of this manoeuvre.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autorotation

The autorotation and emergency training needs to be trained every year by qualified pilots. We hope you enjoyed our answers,

Best regards, Ask a Pilot.