We landed and shut down the helicopter, whereupon the utility boat took us in tow toward the airport some five miles away. The amphibious capabilities of the H-3 made the lake our landing spot of choice, especially since we had the CG boat nearby to tow us to a local airport with a seaplane ramp. The emergency procedures for that situation call for landing as soon as practicable, since chips indicate imminent failure of the gear box and probable loss of directional control. !ĭuring hoist training with a Coast Guard boat on Lake Ponchartrain, LA, the Tail Rotor Gear Box warning light came on, indicating the presence of metal chips. It’s close to the beach, and the helipad there is surrounded by sand which is heavily populated with sand spurs. The post script to this story is that we delivered the barefoot survivors to Coast Guard Station Grand Isle, LA. (We did decline a request from one who wanted to go back to the raft to retrieve some forgotten luggage.) Until all 15 were on board, we didn’t know what the final count would be, and as they continued to pour out of the raft, the rescue took on aspects of the Circus Clown Car Skit, in which a seemingly endless stream of clowns keep on popping out of a tiny car. The John Boat proved a capable ferry, and we soon had all 15 safely on board. To avoid bringing the raft under our rotor blades, we used the John Boat to carry a line to the raft, then backed just enough to keep the raft outside the rotor disc. Interrogation disclosed that there 12 more people inside the covered raft, oil rig workers whose presence was omitted in the initial report.
There were 3 people in the John Boat, so we landed nearby, and motioned for them to paddle to us. We arrived on scene in time to observe the work boat slipping beneath the waves, with an inflated 9 man raft and a 12′ 2 John Boat (flat bottom, square ended duck hunting boat) along side. The report indicated that there were three people on board. We launched from New Orleans to assist an oil rig work boat reported taking on water in the Gulf of Mexico. The timing worked out perfectly, and we scooped him to safety just ahead of the next wave. We then made a partial water landing downstream of the struggling swimmer between the wave crests, and let the current carry him to us. After a quick discussion on procedures, we rigged the rescue platform, a 4 foot by 4 foot perforated metal device which fits in the cabin door.
An attempt to hoist him failed as he was too tired to swim to the rescue basket. He was caught in a rip tide carrying him away from the jetties parallel to the shore line, in strong surf from a coming storm. Arriving on scene, we discovered that one person had managed to climb on to the rock jetty and make his way to safety, but the other was foundering in the surf. We were dispatched from New Orleans to Destin, FL to assist some boaters whose craft had struck a jetty, throwing them in to the water. The chastened fisherman quickly untied and sped away. Undaunted, we made a water landing, taxied closer to the vessel, and used the small blackboard we carried for such occasions to get the message across. Because of the rotor downwash from the helicopter, however, we couldn’t get close enough to make ourselves understood. Since all Coast Guard officers are also Federal Law Enforcement officers, we came to a hover and tried using hand signals to indicate that the vessel was illegally moored to the day marker. The occupants were fishing, and waved happily as we flew by. Thinking the vessel might have broken down, since it’s illegal to use navigation aids as mooring buoys, we made a low pass to investigate. We were flying over Mississippi Sound on a Fisheries Enforcement Patrol when we noticed a boat tied up to a day marker. On the last Sikorsky HH-3F “Pelican” helicopter was retired from Coast Guard service, marking the end of Coast Guard Aviation’s “amphibious era.” I flew the H-3 for almost 2000 hours, and by 1977, when we stopped recording helicopter landings, I had more than 100 water landings in the Pelican, some of them recounted in the following anecdotes: Pelican Tales: The last of the Coast Guard’s Amphibious Aircraft
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