Lama helicopter scenic flight

[happytraveller]

Time to share the fun!!!

Some good weather when I was in Switzerland recently, so I took the opportunity to do a 40 minute helicopter flight from Zermatt. Had a choice of helicopters too, so picked the Lama, which I had never flown in before. The flight starts from the heliport in Zermatt, then heads down the valley before turning towards the glaciers and back towards the Matterhorn. Sadly, some cloud had come up around the Matterhorn whilst I was waiting for the flight, so you do not get any close shots of the Matterhorn, but the rest of the flight is very scenic. Great flying by the pilot too, perfect height and also near to the summits and glaciers. The take off and descent before landing are especially notable.

The video is about 11 minutes, condensed down from over 40 minutes of flying. If you only want to watch the highlights, then the take off and the descent before landing are the parts to watch. The ears certainly felt the descent, he did not hang around!!!! I have had to compress the video a lot from the original to get it under the 500mb upload limit, hope that the quality is still ok.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR-ZwNWpKls

Zermatt is the resort for the rich and the famous (and me!). I saw a watch for sale there for 167 200 CHF, which is NZD 238 415.

If anybody is planning a trip to Switzerland, then the helicopter scenic flights at Interlaken and also in Zermatt are highly recommended.

Smooth landings.

[spongebob206]

What more can I say but Bloody amazing

Whats with the lodge on top of the peak, bugger living there.

Thanks for sharing the experience mate

Cheers

[happytraveller]

it is a mountain hut on the Italian side. If you look at the mountains just before and after this hut, then you will see people walking (with snowshoes) and climbing up to it. Wish that I could remember the name of it as it would be great to go there for a night.

I think that it was one of the best helicopter flights that I have done. The other 'top' helicopter flights were around the Eiger and Jungfrau earlier this year, and of course, the helicopter flights up to Mt. Aspiring.

Must get the sim going and try the whirlybirds again.

smooth landings.

[Ian Warren]

Jerry , every time someone mentions Interlaken , I keep thinking of Combat Flight Simulation 1 , great spot for shooting down Jerry bombers .. jeez that program was so long ago 1996/7 , Great video

[Charl]

I do enjoy your reports from far and wide, that's a good clip.
Of course this being a Flight Simulator site, there is some simulation to be done, looks like a great round trip.
I already have CH Pro, am downloading the Zermatt Lama, and will no doubt put up a reall vs sim screen or two!

[spongebob206]

QUOTE (happytraveller @ Nov 5 2011,8:28 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If you look at the mountains just before and after this hut, then you will see people walking (with snowshoes) and climbing up to it.

Yeah, I could see the people, what a hike. Funny how it is just up there Nothing but rocks and a Lodge.

[Charl]

I did have a fly... probably not as far south as the real trip, because I ran out of scenery!
Same neck of the woods, I hope...



I also passed on the Lama, settling for something a little more civilised.
The Lama surely must be at the limit of its performance, you are consistently at 10,000ft and above.

I had always wondered at the greyness of the rock in Switzerland Pro's scenery, so was glad to see the Gneiss in the video looks pretty much like that.



I enjoyed simulating the tour, keep them coming Jerry!

[Naki]

Nice vid...and nice shots Charl..IIRC the Lama has excellent high altitude performance...henve the Indians, South Americans and Nepalese use them

[happytraveller]

Yep, the Lama has excellent high altitude performance. I found this piece on Wikipedia:-

"Operational history
Helicoptere Lama2.jpg

The Lama was designed specifically for high-altitude performance and during demonstration flights in the Himalayas during 1969, an SA315B carrying a crew of two and 120 kg of fuel landed and took off at the highest altitude then recorded, 7,500 m (24,605 ft). On 21 June 1972 a Lama with a single pilot (Jean Boulet) aboard established a helicopter absolute altitude record of 12,442 m (40,814 ft), immediately followed by an inadvertent record for the longest ever autorotation when the engine flamed out at the peak altitude of the flight.[2][3]

Nice screenshots there. When I saw the screenshot of the Matterhorn, I seem to remember that somebody has issued a photoreal package for the Matterhorn, cannot remember who it was though. Might be one of the French developers. The memory goes with age!!

smooth landings.

[Charl]

Wow 40,000ft in a helicopter!
I had it in my mind that a Squirrel was the altitude holder, one landed on Mt Everest.
My EC135 got really mushy after 11,000ft.

The Matterhorn was a bit of a disappointment in the sim, you'd really think Switzerland Pro would have taken a little trouble with it.
There should be hardly any snow on it, it's so steep.
Just one more disappointment with that very expensive FS9 addon.

Trivia: more than 500 people have died climbing the Matterhorn... go figure.

[happytraveller]

I was wrong, the add on photoreal scenery for the Matterhorn is Italian, not French. Here is the link, might be what you are looking for:-

http://www.fsdownload.com/modules.php?name...cle&sid=860

smooth landings.

[Charl]

Being mildly compulsive, I went looking again for a Lama.
Salzgeber has gone payware, and put his FS9 Lama inside a payware FSX version.
But wait! the internet is more resourceful and I located an old (but quite good!) FS2002 version, and with only slight massage, applied a Zermatt repaint to it.



Voila! but now the question remains: where did that flight actually go?
GE provides the clue...



And since everything else is buttoned down, how about that backflip takeoff, and dive down the valley?



All in a day's flightsim fun...