Kenny Keller provides practical night-flying guidance for helicopter pilots: pre-flight preparation (use checklist, pre-flight inside under bright light, then move outside in dark for walkaround and fuel), lighting and eyesight rules (avoid bright lights ~30 minutes before flight; allow ~30 minutes — or up to ~60 minutes for NVG-trained pilots — for eyes to adapt), fuel reserves (stated minimum of 20 minutes reserve for helicopters, day or night), approach technique (fly approaches the same as daytime but be aware of night runway illusions), and equipment reminders (carry flashlights and spare batteries, check dimmer switches, ensure position lights on from sunset to sunrise).
Questions this video answers
About 30 minutes prior to flight (allow eyes to adapt).
Give yourselves a half hour for your eyes to adjust; NVG training may indicate up to an hour or more.
20 minutes reserve (he says '20 minutes at night, 20 minutes in the day').
From the beginning of civil twilight to the end of civil twilight as published in the American Air Almanac, converted to local time.
Sunset to sunrise.
Chapters
First really good tip, avoid bright lights 30 minutes prior to flight. Flashing green and white lighted land airport. Make sure you have plenty of fuel and make sure you get the right fuel. 20 minutes, I should say 20 minutes at night, 20 minutes in the day. For a helicopter, it's the same. Gotta have 20 minutes of reserve. Probably better have even more than that because it's hard to get fuel sometimes at night depending on where you're at. And I would say not just one flashlight but at least two spare batteries. And don't forget your key. It's. Right now we have, we're in here, pretty brightly lit area, bright lights because we want to do a good pre flight. Inside with the light. Get everything done inside. Move outside where it's dark. Do our fuel last minute walk around, go and do last minute planning. Give yourselves a half an hour for your eyes to adjust. We learn from basic private pilot training. Minimum 30 minutes prior to flight. Avoid bright lights. In the night vision goggle training that I've had for doing EMS flying, they say that it can be actually up to an hour or more before your eyes really adjust. So get your aircraft pre flighted inside. Of course, using your checklist as always, good pre flight, day or night doesn't matter. Then move it outside, give your ice time to adjust, do your fuel, whatever else you need to do and get ready to go. Make sure all your checks minimum on battery time. Check what you got to check. Battery back off. Must your aircraft position lights be on sunset to sunrise. Make sure all your checks minimum on battery time. Check what you got to check. Battery back off. Some of the other key stuff about night flying. Question asked a lot. How do you fly your approaches in a helicopter at night versus the daytime? You get all kinds of crazy answers. The answer is the same way. You fly them during the day, you fly your approaches at night the same way as you do in the daytime. You just have to be aware of the different illusions that can take place while you're coming into the Runway where the Runway is coming at you faster than what you think it is. It can appear that it's farther away. And there's some other Runway illusions too that play in. But the main thing is you fly your approaches the same way at night. What is the definition of night? Definition of night. The beginning of civil twilight to the end of civil twilight as published in the American Air Almanac Almanac converted to local time. Don't forget your flashlight so you can see what in the world you're doing in the middle of the night. Flashlight phone app. Pretty cool huh? Thanks to my 8 year old. And easy to do when you're by yourself. Don't forget your gas cap after you put the fuel in. Very easy to forget. And walk around with your flashlight. I always thought that was a good thing we pre flighted inside. When you're walking around looking at your aircraft with your flashlight point in specific areas, you might catch something you couldn't see inside in the bright light. Well, another good one. And another one I think. Super important. This seems kind of simple, but this can happen to you. You have your power on, you go flip your panel, lights on and you got nothing. You start freaking out. Don't forget to check the dimmer switch. Voila. May sound pretty simple, but these things love to vibrate. And if you haven't flown at night for a while or the helicopter flies much, these things have a habit of turning themselves down. And I have another story on that one I'll tell sometime. But a couple of dumb mistakes I made and all it took was the dimmer switch. So don't forget to check the dimmer. Alright, let's go fly. It.
