Survival Arts

Course Review: Underwater Aircraft Escape with LTR

Survival Arts welcomes back old friend and contributor from the early days of this blog, Eric Cartman. - Russell

In September 1999 I had the opportunity to attend the 20th Annual SOF Convention. Part of my reason for going was to take advantage of the various training seminars offered which included jump, medical and underwater airframe escape. As it turned out most of the classes were canceled for various reasons, but the underwater airframe escape, given by Learn to Return Training Systems of Anchorage Alaska was not. Being a pilot, I this would be an interesting opportunity to expose myself to something new. Even though I had been flying for some time, I had never considered such training on my own, even though I regularly attend various training courses. The thought of what might happen if I ditched a plane or helicopter into water seemed simple enough. Emergency checklist, radio calls, open the doors or windows to keep water pressure from sealing you in, crash and exit the craft when/if you can. Seemed simple enough. Well, not really, as I was about to find out.

The Class

Training consisted of 4 hours of classroom time followed by hands-on simulator training in the hotel swimming pool. Although large facilities exist with mechanical “dunkers” which include complete sections of various airframes, LTR has also designed man-portable devices that they can bring to any facility that has a reasonably sized swimming pool.

The class consisted of about 8 people from various backgrounds from the military, law enforcement and civilian worlds. Everyone was treated pretty much the same. The class was taught by Brian Horner, the President of LTR, and John Evans. Both have extensive military and rescue experience as well as numerous other credentials. Their rescue experience became immediately evident during the initial slide show, which included a large number of photos from actual rescues. The slide presentation included some great images of helicopter ditches in progress, as well as some “rescue faux pas” such as a rescue boat getting caught up in the rotor of a sinking Sikorsky helicopter!

LTR does a lot of training of oil platform workers and others who routinely travel significant distances over water in rotorcraft. Unlike fixed wing aircraft, which tend to float even if flipped over during a water landing, helicopters have a high center of gravity and are often operated with no doors. This combination tends to lead to almost instant submersion upon completion of autorotation or, if the helicopter is well sealed, a roll-over followed by a slower inverted submersion. Many over-water rotorcraft are therefore fitted with inflatable pontoons that can be deployed in an emergency, thus allowing the craft to float upright... but even those systems can fail, as was evidenced by the picture of the sinking Sikorsky (its right pontoon developed a leak, leading to an eventual roll-over after everyone was evacuated).

The lecture covered basics such as the characteristics of survivors, heat loss and heat loss prevention. Various protective equipment and crash positions were explained, as were pre-crash techniques that one can use to reduce injuries once you get into the “ground phase” of your flight. Several generally useful tips for crash positions were provided, e.g. being certain that one’s lap belt buckle is accessible even if you are in the standard bent-over crash position. This allows you to get free of your seat even if injured or otherwise unable to sit up. There have been actual instances of people being trapped by their seatbelt. Also, the standard inflatable life vests provided on commercial jet aircraft can be worn and partially inflated to act as a cushion for the upper body upon impact.

The next segment of the lecture covered various impediments to exit after the crash, such as fire, smoke, lack of visibility due to water depth or turbidity and running out of air. This was followed by an explanation of the significance of knowing where the nearest exists are when boarding aircraft, understanding how to operate the window/door jettisons, and a technique that uses a pre-defined reference point to allow you to re-orient yourself after the crash even if you’ve had your brains well scrambled.

The final segment covered miscellaneous tidbits like the fact that fixed wing aircraft tend to sink nose first, which often results in panicked passengers and crew swimming up to the aft section where the last air bubble is and then becoming trapped due to lack of an exit point. Rescue procedures were also touched upon, including less known items such as the fact that helicopter rotors can create significant static charge on the flying craft. A rescue basket or line that is being lowered to you can give a strong shock if one reaches out to it before it touches the ground. This can also lead to ignition of spilled fuel floating on the water or ground.

With the classroom portion over, we were instructed to arrive at the hotel pool later that evening, fully clothed and with a towel…

Witch Dunking

I arrived 1900 at the hotel pool to a surreal scene. The SOF convention had a knife fighting contest that evening, so a platform was set up at one end of the pool and various “contestants” were getting ready. There was also a bar set up, and numerous people were milling around getting boozed up. Wannabes in their brand new BDUs, bikers, old Vets with beer guts, cleancut law enforcement types, manufacturer reps from the likes of Colt and H&K, press photographers and probably more than a few locals that just decided to see what was going on. The pool itself had dunking machines in the process of being set up, with an array of glaring halogen lights trained on it. It could have been the set of a James Bond movie, with the bad guys assembling their latest doomsday device. And the paramedics. Seems that the hotel insisted that an ambulance was on standby during the class lest they be held liable for something. Brian and John seemed annoyed at this last part, given that they had never had a serious injury during years of conducting such classes... not to mention that John was a Pararescueman and Brian is an EMT.

Over the next few minutes the rest of the class arrived and the first dunking machine was installed in the shallow end of the pool. The machine consisted of two aluminum crew type seats attached back-to-back on a long pole that was supported at both ends by an A-frame. This allowed the seats to sit at just above water level. The bottom of the A-frames were connected on the pool floor by a square frame which had a small vertically mounted door attached to the perimeter. If you dived under the water right next to the seats, the door looked like a cargo hatch you might find on the side of a small to medium aircraft. Two bright yellow grab handles were mounted on the frame next to each side of the door, one for each dunkee.

The infernal part of the apparatus was this: the pole to which the two seats were mounted on could rotate, thus taking both passengers from a comfortable, belted-in, upright position to being held upside down and under water in under a second. Not all that much different from the contrivances used to encourage “witches” to confess during the Inquisition. The only difference was that you got to go dual vs. solo. The following links shows the apparatus in use:

Preparing for the crash
Glug, glug...

Drowning in 4 feet of water

As it turned out, I was the last person to go through this. Not that I’m chicken or anything, it just worked out that way. Yeah. Before the simulator, we were instructed on the exact sequence of actions we should perform to get from being underwater, belted into the chair, to exiting through the make-believe aircraft hatch. The first step is to sit still until all motion stops: no point in popping your belt to get tossed around and lost in the water as it floods in. Next, you bring one of your hands to a predetermined spot on your body, such as your thigh and then, using touch, walk your fingers over to a known point that you can grab solidly, such as a door handle, arm rest or structural member. Once you have a solid grasp on this point, you pop your restraint system and pull yourself over to the hold point by contracting your arm muscles towards the torso. The purpose of this is to have a guaranteed known orientation before starting any movement towards an exit. It’s surprisingly easy to become disoriented when underwater, even when you have light and decent visibility... much less in pitch-black conditions.

I figured this was going to be easy. I had spent a lot of time in and under the water. I’d been caught and pounded into the sand by strong ocean surfs, stuck in rip tides and rivers that were so fast you couldn’t stay on your feet, and I could swim almost 50 meters under water. Now I was in the shallow end of a hotel pool, what could go wrong?

The dunker was turned over and I immediately got a snoot full of water. No nose plugs were allowed, as you don’t travel with them in the real world. Sure you can hold your nose, but at some point you need your free hand to release the seatbelt. We were told to expect this and just deal with it. Wanting to get my head upright and clear the water out of my nose, I immediately popped my belt, to hell with finding a reference point. As I fell out of the seat onto the pool bottom, I blew some air out of my nose to clear the water. Next step was to find the damn door and get topside. Hmmm, now where is the door? I was starting to notice that my air situation was getting a little uncomfortable. Yet even with my eyes open in a clear, lit pool I couldn’t seem to find that door. I knew it was only an arm's reach away, but still, no matter where I looked, no door. Ouch! My face scraped the concrete pool bottom as I was looking around. “What the hell is the pool bottom doing over there?” I thought to myself. At that point I realized that I was pretty much out of air and didn’t even know which way was up. OK, time to give it up, surface and take the well deserved barbs that will be coming. Now, which way is up? Damn, got to get some air. Since we wore clothing into the pool, the extra weight made me just about perfectly neutral in buoyancy, so there was no “floating to the top”. I then noticed the leg of one of the instructors in my peripheral vision as he approached. Probably wondering what the hell I was doing just lying on the bottom of the pool like an idiot. My orientation instantly returned and I saw the door, a few feet away. I surfaced, gasping for breath.

Once I got some air back into my lungs, the instructor explained to me what I had done wrong (dropping my restraint before having a grasp on my orientation point). I went through the simulation again, making damn sure I did exactly as I was told. No problem the second time around. Wait for the roll to stop, walk my hand out to the grab handle, drop the belt, pull myself to the handle. Once I’m at the handle I know which way is up and exactly where the door is. I’m out in 15 seconds with plenty of air left. This exercise was repeated a few times until everyone had it down.

The tunnel

We were given a break and allowed to get out of the water while another section was added to the dunker. It’s cold hanging around in dripping wet clothing, even in Las Vegas during the autumn, but it was nice to have some time to drain the 2-3 quarts of water from my sinuses. The new section added to the dunker was completely under water. A 20 foot ladder section was added to the frame at the pool bottom. The first 2-3 feet were bare and the next 10 were covered by a small tunnel made of nylon stretched over metal hoops. At the end of the tunnel was a frame that had a set of bungee cords stretched across it, and a few feet beyond that there was another aircraft type hatch, but with a more complicated latch setup. To exit the tunnel one had to worm his way through the net made of bungee cords.

We were instructed to get back in the pool two at a time and go through the same dunking routine, except that we had to exit via the tunnel. Except for some extra time and the initial novelty of the tunnel/ bungee combination, it was pretty much the same thing. After we had all been through, the new configuration we were told to gather around the instructor at the dunker side of the tunnel. We were told that our aircraft was about to ditch and we had 15 seconds to figure out what to do. Once the signal was given, everyone had to go under, and stay underwater until they exited via the hatch at the far end of the tunnel. The instructor started the countdown as we tried to organize ourselves in some reasonable fashion. At 15 seconds we all went under. It was nice to not have water up my nose this time around. I went next-to-last since I knew I could stay under for at least a minute if I were prepared. I patiently waited as people disappeared through the tunnel. As the person in front of me started in, I lined myself up and followed close behind. Knowing that there was one more person behind me, I opted to pull myself along without any leg movement. I had learned from previous experience that having people stacked up close with limbs flailing is a bad combination. Unfortunately the guy in front of me didn’t know this, and I got a nice kick in the face as he tried to get through the bungee barrier.

After this exercise we were paired up again, and got to go through the dunking routine, but with blackout goggles on. This part was surprisingly easy, once you got over the psychological aspect of “Oh shit, I can’t see, and I’m in an small enclosed space with only one way out.” The final phase was the group exit exercise again, but this time with everyone wearing blackout goggles. I made sure I was last that time and waited a few seconds after I felt the person in front of me move down the tunnel.

Each exercise was recorded and graded. People who had trouble were encouraged to repeat the exercise as many times as they were willing to go through it.

The cube

The final simulator involved a large man-sized cube built out of PVC pipe. The cube had a helicopter seat mounted inside as well as real cyclic and collective control sticks. The outside was covered with netting except for the left and right sides. The left side had a removable plexiglass window, and the right side had a pull-ring type jettisonable door. The cube was perched on the edge of the deep end of the pool. After the student climbed in, via the door, he was sealed in and then rolled off the edge by fellow students into the pool.

The instructors were always present in the water during any of the simulations, wearing dive masks, snorkels and separate air tanks and regulators ready, if someone got stuck (no one did). They would lend any required assistance, as well as watch for proper technique and cheating. Yes, people do cheat! Not everyone takes this course voluntarily. Many oil company employees are required to be certified in order to keep their jobs.

The instructors followed the sinking cube, and would add additional tumbling and rolling motion to it on the way down. Once the cube settled, the student would exit via the window or door jettison. As the night went on, this activity devolved into various taunts and prods followed by a hasty roll into the pool before the person in the cube could respond. Needless to say, every round of this led to ever more creative paybacks by the last person to be rolled in.

The cube on its way in

During the end of the class we were given the opportunity try on several cold-water survival suits (everyone was pretty well chilled from being in the water and in wet clothing for 3+ hours) as well as additional runs through the simulators. As fun as the course was, it was serious business. If you couldn’t perform the required tasks, you did not get a certificate. Several people opted out before the class was over.

I was offered more pool time in the following day’s class, but weaseled out due to still feeling like an amphibian from all the previous night’s water breathing.

About LTR: Costs & Contact Info

The basic course costs around U.S. $185, depending on where it is given. Included are a very useful information booklet and - if you pass the simulations - a certificate of completion that is good for 2 years. This certificate is required by many insurance carriers for people who routinely fly long distances over water in rotorcraft or small planes.

Although LTR is based in Alaska, they give training sessions all over the world, including cold weather survival, underwater aircraft escape using a HEEDs bottle, jungle survival, disaster & earthquake response and numerous other courses. Courses range from 2 to 96 hours of actual training time.

LTR Training Systems
230 East Potter Drive, Unit One
Anchorage, Alaska 99519
survival@alaska.net

Eric Cartman

Posted by Russell Whitaker at October 18, 2003 09:30 PM | TrackBack