Episode 341: Robinson R-44 Flight Into Chicago Vertiport

And we use vertiport all the time in ems when we come up to Chicago, if we can't land at the hospital or whatever, we'll come to the vertiport. And the vertiport is not exactly what it used to be either. As you can see, half of it's turned into a bus depot. And as Kenny mentioned earlier, technically, the vertiport is a private place. You can land here, but they just request that you call in advance and say, hey, I'm coming in, and whatever.

Yeah, thanks for the disclaimer, Chris. If you're watching this video, either call.

Them or there is an online thing where you can get online and just, you know, you give them your name, your aircraft, what time you think you're going to be here and what time you're departing. And that's all you got to do. They. They don't even say no. They. I don't even think they respond. They just want you to know, live to fly another day.

Helicopterground.com so one thing interesting that I find about flying in downtown Chicago is ultimately you can fly downtown Chicago and you don't have to talk to anybod, which I. I think is wonderful and great. I'm just surprised since, you know, what happened 9, 11, that we're able to do that. And it's a privilege. I'm glad we get to do it. I haven't done a long time. So that was another reason why since I knew Chris was coming down, I'm like, hey, I want you to go with me. Because Chris has been up here more recently, not only flying EMS but doing Chargers because he's done some 135 charter work the last four or five years at least. Right, Chris?

Yep.

So he's been up to Chicago a lot. So I said, yeah, I could figure it out and I know what to do. But, you know, in case anything's changed, I haven't been there in a long time. Let's all go up there. And the only thing we had to do, I'll kind of point the camera. Where we came from, we came from the east. And behind us is Chicago airport, which is a towered airport. So we did have to talk to Gary as we're. Did I say chicago airport?

Okay, I meant Gary.

But it's Gary. Chicago, right?

Yep. Gary. All right, so. So Gary's at class delta.

So we followed the lakeshore simple call to Gary. And I remember that they're pretty laid back. They know when your helicopter, you just transition through. We stay just off the shoreline and It's a pretty easy transition. So now we're gonna head downtown Chicago, and Chris will jump up here when he wants to and give us some feedback on getting in and out of the city. But basically, we usually when I was doing it way back, we just fly the shoreline right up to downtown. And then when I was doing ems, you'd be going to a different hospital here or there. We have to watch out for bravo and charlie, but those are both west of downtown. So you can literally fly the lakeshore, as we're showing you now. We can fly the lakeshore all the way up to downtown, and we can fly over navy pier. We can fly around the buildings, of course, you know, using caution and always keeping in mind. Where am I going to go in the case the engine quits?

But. Yep. And not to change subjects, but we're going to look at the vertiport here. Okay, yeah, you see that?

Go ahead and tell us all about it.

If you see that smokestack right there kind of in that group, that's a. That's a key point to look at. And we're flying along lakeshore. A lot of times, I'll fly right over here, and I'll pick up this highway to the left. Okay. And that's actually going to be the skyway route inbound. Okay. So we'll make our way over here. And we're staying low. We're probably about 600ft off the ground right now. And we're staying low because we have midway, which is class Charlie, and when it happened, and we have o', hare, that's over here. So there are jets coming in and out. And I'm surprised we don't see a lot more of them today. But since the wind's coming out of the west, they're going to be landing to the west. So they're coming over the lake. They're coming over the city and landing. So we're staying low below them. So what I usually do is I. I look for that smokestack, and then I start finding the highway. So this highway right here, which I don't even know what that is. 90, I think, right here. I'll run that north. Okay, so then. So this is the skyway route right here. And so I run the skyway. There's my smokestack. I run the skyway north up to these tracks right here. And then as you. Soon as you come up on the tracks, you're gonna hang it left.

And look at all those people in line on the Runway or the Runway, the Roadway barely moving.

So here are the tracks. Okay. And now the vertiport's one of those where it's kind of hidden in all the scenery down here.

Those some good landmarks to get over here, though.

Oh, yeah. Vertiport traffic helicopter 181Mike Bravo is approach from the east. We're just going to do an approach and then depart west over to port. So I run. So part of the reason is the railway here is a nice landmark to see, but it also gives you an open area. Because if I should have an engine failure right now, where am I going? I'm going right down on the tracks. If you look over here to about our one o', clock, you see that kind of. You got the huge open parking over there. Then you got this small little area right here. And that's the vertical.

Okay.

So we slowly just. What I usually do is just start slowing down, start coming down. And I keep the nose pointed into the wind here. And I just start slowly sliding over.

There's a yellow R44 down there. I see it now.

Yeah. So you're going to come over this building. Well, not quite over the building. I'm just going to cut the corner right here. You got the subway that comes through. And we use vertiport all the time in ems. When we come up to chicago, if we can't land at the hospital or whatever, we'll come to the vertiport. And the vertiport is not exactly what it used to be either. As you can see, half of it's turned into a bus depot. And as kenny mentioned earlier, technically, the vertiport is a private place. You can land here. But they just. They just request that you call in advance and say, hey, I'm coming in and whatever.

Yeah, thanks for the disclaimer, Chris. If you're watching this video, either call.

Them or there is an online thing where you can get online and just, you know, you give them your name, your aircraft, and what time you think you're going to be here and what time you're departing, and that's all you got to do. They don't even say no. I don't even think they respond. They just want you to know. So that's the vertiport. I'll turn tails coming left. And so before COVID they used to run flight tours out of here all the time. And I don't even think they have 100 low lead truck here anymore. They do have jet a truck, but anyway, that's the vertiport. You park in one of those Circles. There's three circles there for you to land in. And then you just walk right inside on the side door there. And. And then you can hang out here. You can catch an Uber to Soldier Field or you can do whatever. All right, warning caution lights look good. Everything's looking good. Full power coming up.

Is there a landing fee, you know.

In a piston model? I don't. I don't know, to be honest with you. Okay, now, is there a landing fee when I come in here for charter? Yep. Absolutely. Okay. They charge you like crazy. I'm coming right, because we are close to the inner circle of the class Charlie for Midway, which is to our left.

Okay.

So if you depart westbound and you turn south, you're gonna go right into the Charlie. So you got to be aware of that. And there is kind of a noise sensitive area right through here. So what they do is you just kind of depart westbound.

Okay, so I saw that. Like you shot to where they want you to land, correct?

Yep. And then you hover taxi over to. And you park on one of the circles.

Okay. So you park in one of the circles.

And they do have somebody here 24 hours. So there is like you saw. I don't know if you saw the guy in the LVs coming out. They will. I did. If you call them up on the 2305, they will come out and they will, you know, they'll usually answer you and they'll come out and usher you in. Okay. But once we get going out this way, there. There really is. Now we are under Bravo, but this shelf out here is probably 3,000ft or whatever. So we're not even close to being in the Bravo airspace. Row here. So you can kind of come around and you can get this whole circle. We'll kind of go north down here. Chicago area traffic, helicopter 181Mike Bravo just off the vertiport westbound will be turning northbound. Go pick up the shoreline.

And so those. Those of you that might be new to this whole helicopter thing, Chris is transmitting on 12305, which is a common helicopter air to air frequency. So that even though we don't have to talk to anybody here, right around downtown, it's still advisable to self broadcast where you're at, what your intentions are actually.

So 2305 is the vertafore, but 23, I want to switch over to 2302. Okay. Which is more of the air to air helicopter air to air in this area because we have news agencies up here. We've got EMS up here. We've got Chicago Fire and Chicago Police up here. We got a lot of helicopter trip. We got Lake county, that's to the south of us. They're up here a lot. So 12302 is the understood. And it's actually on the chart here that monitor that or talk air to air. So a lot of guys, since we only have one radio, I'm gonna choose to listen to 12302, listen for other helicopter crafts down here.

Well, thanks for straightening me out on that.

So in general, 2305 is your common one. And if I had another radio, I would be monitoring 2305. Sure. Because I'm close to the vertiport right now. If I did have another radio, I would like. When I would fly over here for ems we had two radios. So I'm monitoring like Midway or o' Hare or somebody like that. I'm also monitoring them when I'm coming in. And that's something I wanted to say as well is, you know, we're a busy airspace up here, but these guys are all O' Hare and Midway. They're all concerned about seven, you know, 747s and 737s and all kinds of. They don't care about us. Right. They just want us to stay out of their way. Right. So I will monitor them, but I don't talk to them unless I have to. And, you know, and some people may have a different thought on that, saying, oh, no, I'm close to them, I'm going to talk to them. And. And. Or they may say, you know, well, they got you on radar, so they're another set of eyes for me. Okay, I get that. Right. But we're all squawking ADS B. Now. They know exactly who I am. They know exactly where I'm at. If that's why I monitor. If they want to talk to me, they'll call me up. I mean, I've had that happen before where I'm not even talking and they just happen to call me up and be like, you know, hey, what are you doing?

Is this Wrigley Field over here?

Yep. Right here. Yeah, Wrigley Fields off to our right.

And yes, as we're flying over beautiful Chicago in that water, we can get the full PDF for free. Right here is Private Pilot 101 1, the helicopter training blueprint. You can get this free as a PDF. You could get the paperback, you can get the Kindle, and you can get the audiobook. Now, the privateblueprint.com that's it right Lindsay?

Yep.

The easiest way is privateblueprint.com you can get either the full book in PDF for free download immediately and you can get the paperback version there and it'll take you to take you to Amazon and then we got another one where I'll sign them for you and we'll send from the hogs hanger but I don't remember what that we'll put the link down below the video.

Yeah we will.

Or you can email Heather. You can email Heather too. We will sell you one and I'll sign it for you and imprint whatever you want like hi Dave, you're the greatest R44 pilot of all time. Kenny color 2024 whatever so helicopterground.com for all our courses. Privateblueprint.com for thanks for tuning in. Put your comments down below about flying in and out of Chicago. Thank Chris Hauser for being our captain today and giving us the latest greatest tips and tricks for the heliport vertiport in Chicago, Illinois. So helicopterground.com Peace out.

Goodbye. See you next video when you feel the pressure to fly but know the right decision is to stay on the ground, hit the hogs no go and live to fly another day. Helicopterground. Com.