This is some incredible footage of some Blackhawk helicopters inserting and picking up troops in the mountains of Afghanistan. The blur spots on the screen are there to hide the data contained on the heads up display that could give the location away.
Listen, I have made some insertions and extractions from some pretty tight spots in both the old Huey's and the Blackhawks, but there ain't no way in hell I have ever done such a thing while the bird was kissing the side of a mountain.
This is an incredible testament to the skill of the pilots involved. Something that makes landing and taking off in a helicopter from a mountain is the angle of the slope. If the angle is too great you have a chance of the tail rotor contacting the ground and ruining your day along with a lot of tax payer money in damages to the chopper. Hovering just to the side as troops as boarding or getting off is just as dangerous since as the weight increases or decreases it cause the helicopter to ascend or descend, thereby creating one heck of a problem for the pilot to keep the main rotor from contacting the ground.
Contrary to popular belief, helicopters do not like to lift off straight vertical. They prefer to get a nose down attitude and forward momentum to give them lift. Once again, doing this in the mountains ain't easy or in one case shown here even practical.
Anyway enjoy this for what it is, a real world display of the skill and courage of our armed forces and the conditions that they face in Afghanistan.
Someday maybe I will tell you how I prevented a Blackhawk pilot from landing me in a lake at night, that he thought was a clear field. Damn NVG's.
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