Lockheed Debuts New S-97 Raider Light Tactical Helicopter Video in Marketing Push

The Aviationist ^ | APRIL 21, 2017

[Eddie01]

patient transport

Exactly. I watched a life flight chopper drop down between tall Eucalyptus tree branches on the 101 in Encinitas, CA. Incredible flying but sketch.

This would definitely make such landings less risky.

[wbarmy]

How am I supposed to hang in the door w my boots on the skid?

That brings back some memories. Door gunner in AFG on a blackout flight helicopter doing NOE above the treetops on a cloudy moonless night as fast as we could. My main job was to look for ground flashes to try and give the pilots a warning. That was a roller coaster rides the kids will never see the likes of.

[USNBandit]

I have a couple friends at Sikorsky. As a joke, I offered them a straight across trade, three old S-76Bs for two of these. They countered with the trade plus I bring a huge bag of cash.

[91B40]

I remember.
as a young medic in 1966 I was issued a Jeep-based front line ambulance (M-178, I think). It was basically a stretch M-38 and it was a very good vehicle, both on and especially off the road. I routinely heard, “Hey, Doc. We’re stuck. Pull us out,” from M-151 drivers. My response was usually, “Pound sand. You laughed at my old Jeep. Now you’re stuck. Karma.”
The M151 was a death trap and the front line ambulance version was worse!! Of course, I was familiar with the Jeep platform before I went into the Army.

[chrisser]

We’re in a very rural area of WV. There are two or three ambulances for the whole county.

Nearest hospital with any sort of emergency room is at least an hour drive, and that’s after the ambulance arrives and packs up the patient. I think the “real” trauma center is over 3. It’s not unheard of for a chopper to be sent if someone has a medical emergency or serious injury. Probably happens a couple times a year.

200+mph top speed could likely save a quite a few lives over time.

[chaosagent]

... If you had enough airspeed, you could even stop the main rotor’s rotation altogether and fly it like a fixed-wing biplane (theoretically)...

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Sounds like what Airwolf would do right before it went supersonic. LOL

In fact the head-on shot in the article reminds me a lot of Airwolf.

[johnk]

S-97 RAIDER™: The Next Big Thing in Army Aviation
https://youtu.be/HncZgouxt9k

[Paal Gulli]

"...With twin rotors you can reduce their rotating speed as forward airspeed increases and still maintain lift on the "trailing" side of the aircraft. If you had enough airspeed, you could even stop the main rotor's rotation altogether and fly it like a fixed-wing biplane (theoretically)..."

Sikorsky built an experimental copter that was designed to do that very thing, the S-72 X-Wing. It had a rigid rotor system, and by rigid I mean no teetering, no flapping, no nothing, just rotating. The way the pilot made control inputs was by varying the amount of gas ducted from the engine and out of slots on the leading edges of the blades/wings. Then the gas would be blown back over the top of the wing, producing Coandă effect and some measure of lift. Which is exactly how blown flaps (AKA jet flaps) on airplanes work. They didn't calculate the system could effect enough "pitch change" to generate lift sufficient to support hovering but they did believe it would be capable of very short take-offs and landings.

The most bizarre part was that once it was in forward flight, the rotors were designed to stop spinning and be locked in an "X" configuration along the fuselage (as in the photo below), after which they would perform like conventional wings. Stopping/locking the rotors like this was supposed to greatly decrease drag and remove the limitations of retreating blade stall.

It also had stub wings that were big enough to maintain flight (albeit with very high wing loading) even without the rotor head, because the rotor head was jettisonable so if something happened and they needed to ditch the rotor system (like if they encountered some sort of destructive harmonic), they could blow it off and continue flying on the stub wings. They flew it stub-wings only to make sure it was airworthy and the program was cancelled before it was test-flown in any other configuration. IIRC that was because it fell so far short of their lift performance goals that there was no point continuing.

[octex]

I’d guess the blade configuration would make metro landings safer and the top speed would be an advantage ...
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Air taxi from Dallas to Houston in one hour. Better than a high-speed rail system and much cheaper!

[octex]

In fact the head-on shot in the article reminds me a lot of Airwolf.
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As I recall, the Airwolf was a modified Bell 222.

Really liked that show. (Worked at Bell ‘65-2001)

[csvset]

Funny, I had thought of Airwolf also.

Airwolf theme