What would YOU do in these hypothetical scenarios?

[Simon_Jester]

Well, according to at least 5 different sources from a quick google search, including the manufacturer's site, the pave low is a TRANSPORT/lifting helicopter, not an attack helicopter. Just because it can carry men with guns and glowing green eyes doesn't suddenly mean it's an attack helicopter.

If it has guns, it's an armed helicopter. It has weapons. The military does not sell armed vehicles to private citizens regardless of how much money they own.

How will you force the pilot to land the helicopter? He could shoot you or toss you out of the aircraft or crash the helicopter intentionally. FYI let's say he's a stereotypical drunken Russian man with a thick beard.

Except this can't happen. Because people who are sane enough to not lose their billions of dollars are ALSO sane enough to not hire drunken idiots to fly their personal helicopters. See, the problem is that normal people are not this reckless, and normal people do not associate with people who are this reckless if they can help it.

Because recklessness gets you killed, and in real life people try to avoid being killed.

Until you can construct a scenario that does not involve random, unnecessary recklessness, no one will be interested in your scenarios, except to mock how foolish they are.

Normal people do not act like chavs. Important things are not entrusted to chavs. Chavs do not get rich. Chavs do not control important resources. There are reasons for this. Because chavs are too stupid, ignorant, and clueless- they will lose or damage any precious things in their possession. They will not amass wealth. No one will trust them with anything important. Any person from a chav-like background who ends up with real power must stop acting like a chav. They must learn to concentrate, to plan ahead, to take responsibility for their actions, and to avoid doing petty, stupid acts of vandalism.

Learn how to not think like a chav who does stupid things because "your mates" are busy laughing and getting drunk on cheap beer.

[Archinist]

Well, according to at least 5 different sources from a quick google search, including the manufacturer's site, the pave low is a TRANSPORT/lifting helicopter, not an attack helicopter. Just because it can carry men with guns and glowing green eyes doesn't suddenly mean it's an attack helicopter.

If it has guns, it's an armed helicopter. It has weapons. The military does not sell armed vehicles to private citizens regardless of how much money they own.

But it's not an attack helicopter, designed primarily for actually directly engaging enemy targets. The guns are probably only their for defense, not to directly attack things.

Anyway, let's just say that a ROB made up and specifically designed the scenario and made it happen. It is interesting because in real life you won't expect the weird supernatural things, the only threats you'd expect are wildlife, hazardous environments and humans.

Also, what's up with the "chav" term? According to urbandictionary it just means someone with fancy clothes and broken "gangsta" English.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

Just don't.

You're still not getting Simon's point, which is that military hardware is so heavily restricted and expensive that pretty much anyone who can afford them will not act like a bunch of chavs. Also any responce to "rogue bird" will be to confront them and if they don't stand down or submit a flight plan, shoot them down, oh and before anyone brings up 9/11 those planes did submit a flightplan, it's just that terrorist didn't follow that flightplan and it took time for the autorities to react.

Just ask Broomstick what would happen in Air Traffic Controller detected a "rogue bird" (aka a plane with no known flight plan), she would know as she used to fly planes.

As for EMT/Firemen/what ever, at least where I live and about pretty anywhere in the civilizied world, firemen keep their gear ready to go since even a short delay can mean the difference between a saved life and calling for bodybags.

IIRC most modern firestations have their break rooms on the first floor as close to the fire engines as possible since running down stairs (not casually walking, running as fast as you can) is consired to be "too slow" and the poles old firestations had are considered to be too dangerous to use.

That covers just about every point I wanted to make to Dumber Than Parrots.

[Lord Revan]

Just don't.

You're still not getting Simon's point, which is that military hardware is so heavily restricted and expensive that pretty much anyone who can afford them will not act like a bunch of chavs. Also any responce to "rogue bird" will be to confront them and if they don't stand down or submit a flight plan, shoot them down, oh and before anyone brings up 9/11 those planes did submit a flightplan, it's just that terrorist didn't follow that flightplan and it took time for the autorities to react.

Just ask Broomstick what would happen in Air Traffic Controller detected a "rogue bird" (aka a plane with no known flight plan), she would know as she used to fly planes.

As for EMT/Firemen/what ever, at least where I live and about pretty anywhere in the civilizied world, firemen keep their gear ready to go since even a short delay can mean the difference between a saved life and calling for bodybags.

IIRC most modern firestations have their break rooms on the first floor as close to the fire engines as possible since running down stairs (not casually walking, running as fast as you can) is consired to be "too slow" and the poles old firestations had are considered to be too dangerous to use.

Who said the Pave is taking off from a runway? It's not. It was delivered to someone's back yard in a isolated house worth dozens of millions in the middle of nowhere. The back yard is certified by (???) for safe take offs and landings, but there are sure no ATCs within range. Then they all met there, all the friends, synced their position with the guards's APCs and took off, heading for some equally isolated mountains with magical spirits in them.

You know there's this thing called Radio Detection and Ranging, more commonly called Radar, there's very few places in USA or Europe that aren't under radar coverage and once a plane pops into those radars with identification or flight plan it will be challenged By the closes Air Traffic Control centre. It doesn't matter if you took of from an airfield or you parents basement once you're airborne you MUST submit a flightplan or be shot down it's as simple as that.

And that's assuming you somehow got your hands on military transport.

But it's not an attack helicopter, designed primarily for actually directly engaging enemy targets. The guns are probably only their for defense, not to directly attack things.

If it has guns, those are used to attack things what fuck did you think they were used for, to shoot down missles or bullets?! there's no "you have to have this big guns to be restricted" all military hardware is restricted and if it has mounted weapons it's military hardware and thus resticted.

It's not that hard to get you just have accept that you're not only intelligent person in the world and that other people can act intelligently as well, that's why you scenarios suck so badly they rely totally on the idea that everyone present will act like total morons (sorry I'll correct that I accidently insulted total morons by assuming they'd act as stupid as people in your scenarios).

[Lord Revan]

Just don't.

You're still not getting Simon's point, which is that military hardware is so heavily restricted and expensive that pretty much anyone who can afford them will not act like a bunch of chavs. Also any responce to "rogue bird" will be to confront them and if they don't stand down or submit a flight plan, shoot them down, oh and before anyone brings up 9/11 those planes did submit a flightplan, it's just that terrorist didn't follow that flightplan and it took time for the autorities to react.

Just ask Broomstick what would happen in Air Traffic Controller detected a "rogue bird" (aka a plane with no known flight plan), she would know as she used to fly planes.

As for EMT/Firemen/what ever, at least where I live and about pretty anywhere in the civilizied world, firemen keep their gear ready to go since even a short delay can mean the difference between a saved life and calling for bodybags.

IIRC most modern firestations have their break rooms on the first floor as close to the fire engines as possible since running down stairs (not casually walking, running as fast as you can) is consired to be "too slow" and the poles old firestations had are considered to be too dangerous to use.

That covers just about every point I wanted to make to Dumber Than Parrots.

sometimes I think it would be easier to explain quantum mechnics to my brother's children (who are 3 and 6) then to explain how real life works to this clown (and I alogize to clowns for that comparison but I had to use something).

[Archinist]

Just don't.

You're still not getting Simon's point, which is that military hardware is so heavily restricted and expensive that pretty much anyone who can afford them will not act like a bunch of chavs. Also any responce to "rogue bird" will be to confront them and if they don't stand down or submit a flight plan, shoot them down, oh and before anyone brings up 9/11 those planes did submit a flightplan, it's just that terrorist didn't follow that flightplan and it took time for the autorities to react.

Just ask Broomstick what would happen in Air Traffic Controller detected a "rogue bird" (aka a plane with no known flight plan), she would know as she used to fly planes.

As for EMT/Firemen/what ever, at least where I live and about pretty anywhere in the civilizied world, firemen keep their gear ready to go since even a short delay can mean the difference between a saved life and calling for bodybags.

IIRC most modern firestations have their break rooms on the first floor as close to the fire engines as possible since running down stairs (not casually walking, running as fast as you can) is consired to be "too slow" and the poles old firestations had are considered to be too dangerous to use.

Who said the Pave is taking off from a runway? It's not. It was delivered to someone's back yard in a isolated house worth dozens of millions in the middle of nowhere. The back yard is certified by (???) for safe take offs and landings, but there are sure no ATCs within range. Then they all met there, all the friends, synced their position with the guards's APCs and took off, heading for some equally isolated mountains with magical spirits in them.

You know there's this thing called Radio Detection and Ranging, more commonly called Radar, there's very few places in USA or Europe that aren't under radar coverage and once a plane pops into those radars with identification or flight plan it will be challenged By the closes Air Traffic Control centre. It doesn't matter if you took of from an airfield or you parents basement once you're airborne you MUST submit a flightplan or be shot down it's as simple as that.

And that's assuming you somehow got your hands on military transport.

But it's not an attack helicopter, designed primarily for actually directly engaging enemy targets. The guns are probably only their for defense, not to directly attack things.

If it has guns, those are used to attack things what fuck did you think they were used for, to shoot down missles or bullets?! there's no "you have to have this big guns to be restricted" all military hardware is restricted and if it has mounted weapons it's military hardware and thus resticted.

It's not that hard to get you just have accept that you're not only intelligent person in the world and that other people can act intelligently as well, that's why you scenarios suck so badly they rely totally on the idea that everyone present will act like total morons (sorry I'll correct that I accidently insulted total morons by assuming they'd act as stupid as people in your scenarios).

`Wait, what? Why is there no flight plan? Okay, let's say there is one, which perfectly ties in with them flying up to the mountains and landing there. There are also flight plans for the helicopter to fly around the mountains and the MH-6 to buzz around and shoot things if required.

The guns are not used to aggressively attack something, nor would they be adequate for a attack aircraft. They are mainly there just to shoot at random groups of rag-tag people who might run at your chopper with knives and baseball bats when you're depositing troops or something like that.

I'm saying whether or not they would be restricted, I'm just saying that *most of the time* transport helicopters aren't used in place of bombing aircraft or even lighter strafing run aircraft. I mean, you don't see giant helicopters trying to shoot at tanks and AFVs with a exposed mounted minigun on the side with the man manning it going "rawwwwwrrrr!" from civilized militaries .

[U.P. Cinnabar]

Well, according to at least 5 different sources from a quick google search, including the manufacturer's site, the pave low is a TRANSPORT/lifting helicopter, not an attack helicopter. Just because it can carry men with guns and glowing green eyes doesn't suddenly mean it's an attack helicopter.

You misindentified it as a rescue chopper; I was correcting your mistake. I never said it was an attack helicopter, and I thank you not to put words in my mouth.

I say EMS because it's easier to say and in this case actually does include emergency medicals. I am aware that there will be other groups arriving on the scene. But still, it's going to take at least 10 minutes for the actual physical vehicle to actually get there and drop the people off. They can't just teleport there.

The 911 call will be handed off to the nearest available first responder. The response cycle is not going to be as tortiselike as you imply. Even Broomstick's sodding parrots can understand that simple concept.

The idea is that you are his best mate, and since he usually puts his best friends before himself, he parked his car and stuff outside, and made space for you. Or maybe it's an elaborate plot by a mysterious group of assassins who want you dead for some reason?

Best friend or no, others above self or no, he's still going to park his car or his crap in his garage, as most people would. It's human nature. My mom, who'd give the shirt off her back for any of her kids without asking(in spite of her kids, sometimes), parks her freaking car in her carport, even if she knows I'm driving down for a visit. Human nature, son.

It is still very difficult to smash open a car window, especially in a panicky situation with your mental and physical strength diminished.

For you, perhaps. Offering violence to the car window would be the first reaction of a panicky person suffocating from CO poisoning. And, one good blow, perhaps two, from a decent hammer(which I carry) would smash the car window out.

How will you force the pilot to land the helicopter? He could shoot you or toss you out of the aircraft or crash the helicopter intentionally.

Assuming he's dumb enough to try and discharge a weapon inside a confined space(such as a helo) while trying to operate the helo. Ditto for trying to toss me out of the airplane, as it would take his hands off the controls. Or, even having a drink or fifteen, because that would require him to take his hands off the controls.

Even drunk, he's going to have that much more common sense than you have when sober.

Speaking of the automatic pilot, it's no effort at all to switch it in, and have ATC talk me down, after overpowering the pilot(who will be strapped in, and at a disadvantage in any physical confrontation, unless, of course, he abandons the controls).

But, in the end, I avoid this entire utterly ridiculous scenario by not getting in a helo flown by a drunk pilot in the first place, just as I would avoid getting a ride with a drunk driver. Life is not a game, son, and you only get one shot at it.

As for the sterotypical drunken Russian with a thick beard...I'm not even Russian, and I find that offensive. What's next, claiming all Russian women look like Brezhnev?!

Who said the Pave is taking off from a runway? It's not. It was delivered to someone's back yard in a isolated house worth dozens of millions in the middle of nowhere. The back yard is certified by (???) for safe take offs and landings, but there are sure no ATCs within range. Then they all met there, all the friends, synced their position with the guards's APCs and took off, heading for some equally isolated mountains with magical spirits in them.

No shit the helo's not taking off from a runway, but from a helipad(or just a clearing, as it's rough-field capable). Because it's a fucking helicopter.

I fail to see how this even remotely addresses Revan's point.

[Broomstick]

Okay, you also have to remember that breaking a window with just a hammer is very hard work, and doing this hard work will cause to require more oxygen, which will massively decrease your time to escape.

Granted that car windows are usually tempered glass, as an adult male (I'm presuming you're an adult – correct me if I'm wrong) you should still be able to punch through the glass with a hammer, tire iron, or the like. You may not have a choice – better make those first few whacks count.

Also, online 911 calls would probably be much slower than normal phone calls, not to mention that even a standard phone call to 911 would probably take the EMS guys at least 15 minutes to arrive and 5 minutes to breach. So that's 20 minutes, I doubt you would last more than 5 minutes in the shed.

Have you ever actuually called 911?

No, they don't take longer than normal phone calls.

Unless you live in the boondocks 911 will be there far sooner than 15 minutes. They'll send whatever they can for that sort of emergency – ambulance, firetruck, police, whatever.

However, I have another scenario, a much more fantasy-oriented scenario this time. It takes place in the fictional Until Dawn (videogame) snowy mountains, but different.

The year is in the extremely distant and unlikely future of 2017, and you are hanging out with all 35 of your exceedingly wealthy friends and are heading to the snowy mountains which are the main setting in Until Dawn. However, you are not on a bus or a car, like the video game. Chad, your best mate, the one who organized the entire outing had brought along a new toy that he bought fresh from the local air force base for hundreds of millions of $, his very own MH-53J Pave Low, one of the most capable helicopters that had ever graced the U.S. air force!

The helicopter is not even demilitarized at all, and it still has full access to it's weaponry and a full stock of on-board ammunition.

No fucking way. Even military copters do not have live ammo on board unless their “mission” calls for it. Ditto for military aircraft of any sort. Carrying a full complement of weapons and ammunition NEVER happens outside of very specific, war-time front-line missions.

No fucking way civilians would be so equipped for any price unless you're talking about a criminal operation.

Chad had also recently outfitted the helicopter with a massively powerful stereo system, which is so loud you forget you're even in a helicopter.

Er... you've never actually been in a helicopter, have you? I have. This is also impossible.

So, your are almost there, only 10 minutes left before the Pave Low hits the ground, the music is blaring so loud that everything seems to be absolutely still, there are dozens of heavy boxes everywhere as cargo for the trip, some of the mates are walking around aimlessly, yelling things and throwing bottles around and out. The pilot, Ben is slightly tipsy and the Pave Low slowly swerves to and fro.

A drinking pilot? In helicopter?

It crashes and we all die.

People walking around at random in a flying helicopter? Again, you have obviously never been in an actual helicopter. (Note: I have).

You cautiously walk out to the Pave Low, but upon arrival you can see it's tightly locked, there is no way to can enter. You know that Mark would have the keys, and you remember him saying he was going out to explore the mountain mines with Chad and two security guards, just in case they ran into a bear or something.

You can't fly a helicopter without proper training. Attempting to do so is almost invariably fatal. I can fly fixed-wing aircraft, I can not fly rotorcraft. The helicpoter is not useful as an escape vehicle but may still have use, see below.

You think of the APCs the guards arrived in. They required biometric evidence of the guard commander to enter, so unless you are going to chop off the commander's eyes and hands and bring them back, there's no way you're escaping like that.

If the guard commander is dead believe me, if chopping off a hand or removing an eye can get me an escape I will do it. If he's alive I won't have to do that, of course (presuming he's on the level) but if he's dead he won't care.

There is a satellite near the Pave Low, but unfortunately it requires a battery pack to operate, without the satellite there is no phone/internet access. For some reason, someone removed the battery pack and put it away somewhere. There is a note attached to the sat. dish saying "Left batt. at old mount shack, xxx Ben" written in scrawled text.

Leaving aside the stupid...

Since it seems I am, at the moment, safe, I will eat, drink, attempt to find a means to carry same with me, and attempt to find a usable weapon with which to arm myself because obviously something Very Bad has occurred.

If I know where the “shack” is I consider attempting to go there to get the battery to start the satellite uplink. If that doesn't seem wise then I physically break into whatever vehicles are at hand (including the chopper) to extract a battery to attempt to use that although the chopper would be the last choice, see next paragraph.

Attempt to get the avionics on the chopper working and use the radio to call for help on frequency 121.5 which is the international “help me” frequency in avaition. Also trip the beacon that is designed to go off in a crash as that will also signal location and need for help – such beacons are accessible so that can in fact be tripped by hand. It may be several days before help arrives so I look to secure my safety and health in the meanwhile.

Granted, that is not knowledge the average person has, but I have it so I will use it.

After that, I look for shelter. Staying at the cabin may not be wise, so I look for a place to shelter at some distance from the carnage but within eyeshot and do my best to disguise it. I really only need a bolt-hole large enough to hold just me. Wait for others to show up/help to arrive. Make forraging missions as needed back to the main cabin for supplies, but sleep in the woods in hiding. (I should also note I have experience in wilderness camping) Also, spend time making ground signals that can be seen from the air indicating distress and need for help.

[Lord Revan]

When I was honorbly discharged (my time of service ended) from the Finnish Defense Force I couldn't even take a sweater with me (I even asked about it) and apart from having a place for rank or service branch patch it was just a normal navy blue woollen sweater and actual combat gear is even more heavily restricted (I could buy a version of that sweater from pretty much any military surplus store in Finland) and that's just personal gear actual combat vehicles will be even more tightly restricted and it doesn't matter if it's Pave Low or Apatche they're both just as restricted.

[Lord Revan]

Broom correct me if I'm wrong but don't Helos need pretty much constant attention from the pilot or very bad things (tm) happen?

[U.P. Cinnabar]

`Wait, what? Why is there no flight plan? Okay, let's say there is one, which perfectly ties in with them flying up to the mountains and landing there. There are also flight plans for the helicopter to fly around the mountains and the MH-6 to buzz around and shoot things if required.

"Wait, what?!" is right. What makes you think that the FAA would allow a civilian pilot to file a flight plan that lets anyone on board his bird shoot things?!

Do the words "Federal offense" mean anything to you?! At all?!

The guns are not used to aggressively attack something, nor would they be adequate for a attack aircraft. They are mainly there just to shoot at random groups of rag-tag people who might run at your chopper with knives and baseball bats when you're depositing troops or something like that.

Why would a group of civilians need to land troops anywhere. What makes you think the FAA would allow firearms on a civilian, non-law enforcement aircraft?! "Random groups of rag-tag people who might run at [the] chopper with knives and baseball bats?!"

Dude, seriously?! What government official, in his right mind, is going to listen to anyone telling such a story, and not get the FBI involved(not to mention grounding your ass so fast your head will spin, and having you slapped with so many armed guards you won't be able to take a shit without an M16 up your ass). Especially after OKC and 9/11?!

sometimes I think it would be easier to explain quantum mechnics to my brother's children (who are 3 and 6) then to explain how real life works to this clown (and I alogize to clowns for that comparison but I had to use something).

Oh, I'm sure even your nieces/nephews will find Archinist's scenarios as painfully stupid as we do. And, they'll win the Nobel Prize in physics long before Dumber Than Parrots gets his head out of his ass, wipes the shit from his eyes and ears, and buys a fucking clue on how the real world goes.

[Lord Revan]

Thankfully my niece (the older of the 2) can barely read finnish so she won't be exposed to this any time soon.

oh and proper flight plan includes but is not limited to your course, purpose of flight, what vehicle(s) you're using, who is/are the pilot(s) and what is the cargo and the FAA or the equilevant authorities are generally dead serious about these things as if they're not people could died and have died in the past. That excuse of "random people might attack the chopper" would be countered with "then don't fly to place where you could get randomly attacked but you're still not allowed to have firearms on board".

this whole thing keeps getting more stupid and absurd since you-know-who rather fixing the orginal problem is trying to put a band-aid to cover it up, putting even more focus on the orginal problem.

[Broomstick]

, it will not take them five minutes to break into a garage.

Because firefighters and EMTs carry axes, which can chop through garage doors(most are thin sheet metal at best). I don't know if the police do on a regular basis.

The police have clubs, tire irons, and the like.

Emergency personnel have the authority to do what is necessary to save a life, including ramming a garage door with one of their vehicles. They will get in, don't worry about that, and do it very quickly.

They still have to get all their own equipment ready, so they don't die/get harmed from exposure from the gases, amonsty other precautions.

Police can hold their breath if necessary, run in, smash the door, then run away. CO will dissapate rapidly with open air venting. Fire trucks will have self-contained breathing apparatus.

When my sister committed suicide via running car in a garage the police just smashed in the door, waited a minute or two, then went in after her. No one hurt but the dead woman. So please don't come back with more bullshit.

Just don't.

You're still not getting Simon's point, which is that military hardware is so heavily restricted and expensive that pretty much anyone who can afford them will not act like a bunch of chavs. Also any responce to "rogue bird" will be to confront them and if they don't stand down or submit a flight plan, shoot them down, oh and before anyone brings up 9/11 those planes did submit a flightplan, it's just that terrorist didn't follow that flightplan and it took time for the autorities to react.

I should also point out that response procedures to “rogues” since 9/11 have been updated. For example, intercept airplanes now have the option to be armed. This is a case where weapons will be on board and usable.

Just ask Broomstick what would happen in Air Traffic Controller detected a "rogue bird" (aka a plane with no known flight plan), she would know as she used to fly planes.

Actually, in the US it is in fact legal to fly without filing a flight plan under many circumstances. Part of what tipped off authorities that there was a problem on 9/11 was that not only did the airliners deviate from their flight plan, but also turned off their transponders which makes them largely invisible to secondary radar (that's the mode ATC usually uses). Much harder to track them with primary radar, but it is certainly possible and the civilian FAA can call on the military for assistance in doing just that, with people trained in doing that.

You know there's this thing called Radio Detection and Ranging, more commonly called Radar, there's very few places in USA or Europe that aren't under radar coverage and once a plane pops into those radars with identification or flight plan it will be challenged By the closes Air Traffic Control centre. It doesn't matter if you took of from an airfield or you parents basement once you're airborne you MUST submit a flightplan or be shot down it's as simple as that.

Again, while the flightplan requirement you mention is the case in many parts of the world it is not the case in the US (and, I believe, parts of Canada but I'm not as familiar with their regulations as the US ones, and in any case, as a foreign pilot in Canada I'd have to be extra careful about my activities).

However, if someone spots an aircraft firing bullets or whatever, though, be sure the FAA will be trying to contact that aircraft over the radio, and sending a couple of fighters to intercept. You better have a damn good reason for doing that. “Drunken lark” is not a good reason. Intercept pilots have zero sense of humor.

It is still very difficult to smash open a car window, especially in a panicky situation with your mental and physical strength diminished.

I could do it.

How will you force the pilot to land the helicopter? He could shoot you or toss you out of the aircraft or crash the helicopter intentionally. FYI let's say he's a stereotypical drunken Russian man with a thick beard.

Oh? Drunken Russian man with a thick beard?

Given it's a life or death situation, I display cleavage and offer him various promises of physical gratification if he lands the helicopter and follows me outside. Whereupon, once we are safely on the ground, I beat the fucking shit out of him.

Yeah, I'll play the woman card if I have to. Remember, I only look harmless.

Although I must object to the Russia stereotype, being half Russian myself.

Who said the Pave is taking off from a runway? It's not. It was delivered to someone's back yard in a isolated house worth dozens of millions in the middle of nowhere. The back yard is certified by (???) for safe take offs and landings, but there are sure no ATCs within range. Then they all met there, all the friends, synced their position with the guards's APCs and took off, heading for some equally isolated mountains with magical spirits in them.

Oddly enough, I would be able to determine, based on a map location, the extent of radar coverage and at what altitude it kicks in (pro-tip – 18,000 feet and above over North America there is radar coverage everywhere to facilitate commercial traffic. How low it goes otherwise varies on location.)

While it is possible to escape radar coverage it's not a trivial problem. Forgive me if I do not go into details on a public message board, I see no reason to make public information that would make it easier for the bad guys to do something in real life if they stumble across it.

I mean, I know how to hotwire an airplane, too, but I'm not discussing that on line, either.

But it's not an attack helicopter, designed primarily for actually directly engaging enemy targets. The guns are probably only their for defense, not to directly attack things.

If it has guns, those are used to attack things what fuck did you think they were used for, to shoot down missles or bullets?! there's no "you have to have this big guns to be restricted" all military hardware is restricted and if it has mounted weapons it's military hardware and thus resticted.

I've been in a lot of former military aircraft. NONE contain weapons. NONE. Zero. Zip. This will not happen. Weapons are stripped from any military aircraft being turned over the civilian hands.

The only weapons you'd get on something like that would be guns you carry on board yourself, and/or something illegal. Good luck with that. Unless you're discussing a very well-funded criminal operation (think Mexican drug lords) it's not going to happen.

`Wait, what? Why is there no flight plan? Okay, let's say there is one, which perfectly ties in with them flying up to the mountains and landing there. There are also flight plans for the helicopter to fly around the mountains and the MH-6 to buzz around and shoot things if required.

That's not how flightplans work. Flightplans are from point A to point B (sometimes with intermediate points along the way). There is no “flightplan to fly around the mountains”.

Let's be generous and assume this was a daytime VFR flight by civilians operating under FAR Part 91 and therefore no flight plan is required. We can drop that part of the scenario.

The guns are not used to aggressively attack something, nor would they be adequate for a attack aircraft. They are mainly there just to shoot at random groups of rag-tag people who might run at your chopper with knives and baseball bats when you're depositing troops or something like that.

NO military aircraft is handed over the civilians still containing weapons. IT DOES NOT HAPPEN. Period. Stop tying to make it happen. The stupid hurts.

Broom correct me if I'm wrong but don't Helos need pretty much constant attention from the pilot or very bad things (tm) happen?

Absolutely. Constant attention. They require more skill and attention than fixed wing aircraft. Also, autopilots in choppers of any sort are rare. Not even sure the military would let you keep a military-grade helicopter autopilot, they'll remove some types of avionics before handing them over to civilians.

The notion of even mildly buzzed pilot successfully piloting a helicopter is pretty ridiculous. I'm not saying it's never been done, but it would be incredibly fucking stupid and dangerous. Drunk pilots are rare these days and getting rarer. Darwinian selection in action.

[Elheru Aran]

I've broken a car window with a screwdriver. All you have to do is lever it more than a centimeter or so away from its groove. *ping* and there it goes.

That'll teach me to lock the keys in there with the engine running...

[U.P. Cinnabar]

Also, autopilots in choppers of any sort are rare.

That I did not know. Thanks, Broom.

[Elheru Aran]

IIRC, if there's any kind of autopilot, it's either an auto-hover (turn helicopter into prevailing wind, hold altitude) or auto-auto-rotate (cut off engine power, allow helicopter to descend slowly, take your chances with whatever's underneath)

[Broomstick]

`Wait, what? Why is there no flight plan? Okay, let's say there is one, which perfectly ties in with them flying up to the mountains and landing there. There are also flight plans for the helicopter to fly around the mountains and the MH-6 to buzz around and shoot things if required.

"Wait, what?!" is right. What makes you think that the FAA would allow a civilian pilot to file a flight plan that lets anyone on board his bird shoot things?!

Do the words "Federal offense" mean anything to you?! At all?!

I realize I'm not quit keeping up with the posting here, but, again, in the US flightplans are not always required. Note that this is not the case in many other parts of the world.

However, the FAA is going to take a dim view of the use of firearms on board an aircraft. For a very specified purpose (let's say, shooting a movie) it might be allowed, but you better notify the Flight Standards District Office (FSDO) in advance and get permission. I've known people who have asked the local FSDO for permission to do things not normally allowed (nothing involving guns, though) and while it is certainly doable it involves considerable paperwork and planning.

Why would a group of civilians need to land troops anywhere. What makes you think the FAA would allow firearms on a civilian, non-law enforcement aircraft?! "Random groups of rag-tag people who might run at [the] chopper with knives and baseball bats?!"

>cough<

In private, civilian aircraft NOT interacting with/landing in the secured area of an airport serving "scheduled service" (i.e. "passenger or freight airlines) you can, in fact, have fire arms on board with the permission of the pilot in command. It is not encouraged, and the FAA will be the first to point out that once you're on the ground local laws apply, but you can as a private pilot, assuming you are also a licensed gun owner, carry your personal firearm on board. Likewise, people going on hunting trips will carry hunting rifles on aircraft.

I will note, however, that shooting bullets from a helicopter in flight is normally forbidden

Law enforcement choppers do not normally carry weapons because firing actually from a helicopter is fucking near impossible. Choppers are used for aerial tracking of suspects, as a camera platform, for spotlights... but not for shooting at people.

Dude, seriously?! What government official, in his right mind, is going to listen to anyone telling such a story, and not get the FBI involved(not to mention grounding your ass so fast your head will spin, and having you slapped with so many armed guards you won't be able to take a shit without an M16 up your ass). Especially after OKC and 9/11?!

^ This.

I've known people who were intercepted while doing perfectly normal and legal flight operations after a ground pounder freaked and called the local 911. Most of the time, there is nothing nefarious going on but EVERY report is investigated thoroughly these days.

[Broomstick]

IIRC, if there's any kind of autopilot, it's either an auto-hover (turn helicopter into prevailing wind, hold altitude) or auto-auto-rotate (cut off engine power, allow helicopter to descend slowly, take your chances with whatever's underneath)

I'll just point out that a successful auto-rotation to a landing means you survive - not that you are uninjured.

One of my pilot buddies had an engine failure in his chopper and saved both himself and his student with a textbook perfect auto-rotation. Then he spent two months on the ground while his broken ribs healed up. Again, that was deemed a properly done emergency procedure.

[Lord Revan]

either way the underlaying problem here is that rather having a vague but plausible scenario You-know-who piles on embelishments so much that it goes implausible since he doesn't have the knowledge to know how the real world works so you end up needing a seriously railroaded idiot plot for the scenario to work (aka everyone in the world needs to be idiots in the exact way that allows the plot to happen). There's a good reason why idiot plots are generally considered a bad thing as are railroaded plots as well.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

I realize I'm not quit keeping up with the posting here, but, again, in the US flightplans are not always required. Note that this is not the case in many other parts of the world.

However, the FAA is going to take a dim view of the use of firearms on board an aircraft. For a very specified purpose (let's say, shooting a movie) it might be allowed, but you better notify the Flight Standards District Office (FSDO) in advance and get permission. I've known people who have asked the local FSDO for permission to do things not normally allowed (nothing involving guns, though) and while it is certainly doable it involves considerable paperwork and planning.

In private, civilian aircraft NOT interacting with/landing in the secured area of an airport serving "scheduled service" (i.e. "passenger or freight airlines) you can, in fact, have fire arms on board with the permission of the pilot in command. It is not encouraged, and the FAA will be the first to point out that once you're on the ground local laws apply, but you can as a private pilot, assuming you are also a licensed gun owner, carry your personal firearm on board. Likewise, people going on hunting trips will carry hunting rifles on aircraft.

I will note, however, that shooting bullets from a helicopter in flight is normally forbidden.

I see. While carrying firearms on board isn't illegal under Federal law, it is frowned upon. Which is good enough for me. Thanks.

I figured shooting from a helicopter in flight was normally against the law, for reasons you stated below.

Law enforcement choppers do not normally carry weapons because firing actually from a helicopter is fucking near impossible. Choppers are used for aerial tracking of suspects, as a camera platform, for spotlights... but not for shooting at people.

I wasn't quite sure of that. Again, thanks.

Dude, seriously?! What government official, in his right mind, is going to listen to anyone telling such a story, and not get the FBI involved(not to mention grounding your ass so fast your head will spin, and having you slapped with so many armed guards you won't be able to take a shit without an M16 up your ass). Especially after OKC and 9/11?!

^ This.

I've known people who were intercepted while doing perfectly normal and legal flight operations after a ground pounder freaked and called the local 911. Most of the time, there is nothing nefarious going on but EVERY report is investigated thoroughly these days.

And, I don't blame them. Better safe than sorry.

[FaxModem1]

OK, I think I know where he's going with this, but that's because I've actually played Until Dawn.

In Until Dawn, a bunch of 'teenagers' (more like actors in their 20s or 30s), are invited to their rich friend's mountain retreat that his family owns. This mountain is a typical horror movie mountain, where it's had a mine, a sanitarium, and a hotel/ski lodge built on it in the last century, before strange crap made them close it all down. It had NO military equipment there whatsoever, in any form.

Said rich kid is the son of a very rich movie director. Minor spoilers, so for the first half of the game, he institutes a Scooby Doo plot on his friends for petty revenge. The key difference about this scenario and Archinist's is that the rich kid had everyone travel to a ski lodge station by car, then tram to their mountain, then subsequently sabotaged the tram, stranding them there.

The rich kid also spent a year setting up fake clues, police recordings, fake newspapers about a killer, special effects, etc, so that his friends would believe it's all real. But this is due to two things, one, he's had training since he was a kid in how to pull off these effects, and he has the money and Hollywood connections to do so. Two, access to police and authorities are remote due to actual weather conditions, and said horror crap on the mountain makes the local authorities stay away during the night for fear of it.

It's also heavily pointed out that said rich kid is mentally unwell and not taking his medication, which makes his friends potentially(it is a video game), figure it out beforehand, with most of them only coming to make sure he's okay.

The big problem is that Until Dawn is not a well written game, and forces the player to make the characters do some really idiotic choices to continue the game. Real people don't act like they're in a horror movie, and take a bath when their friends are disappearing, wander into the creepy wrecked sanitarium, or try and have sex while dealing with potential serial killers.

But, even in Until Dawn, no one is dying from appendicitis and ignoring it, dealing with deadly fumes and ignoring it, or has access to military grade weaponry to play around with, or immediately trust their lives to inebriated people who need to be sober in order to not kill them all. They all relatively have what normal people who pack for a weekend retreat might bring, and treat everything as normal until it stops being so.

[Lord Revan]

The thing is that to successfully use "movie/game logic" one must have a pretty good understanding of how real life works, a well written fantastical/improbable narative bends the rules of reality without actually breaking them, bend those rules too much though and they'll break and your narative with them.

there's reason why an idiot plot is called that, it's because the plot demands everyone to act like total idiots and therefore the plot suffers since no fully functioning adult no matter how poorly educated acts like a total idiot 100% of the time. Even worse is railroaded idiot plots where the character have to be idiots in a very specific way because "the plot says so", nothing in a narative should ever happen because "the plot says so", there should always be a plausible in-universe reason for it (it doesn't have to be a good reason but it has to be a plausible one).

Say for example the main antagonist is really arrogant and therefore underestimates the protagonists, if that's not taken too far it's plausible reason as to why the main antagonist would not do something that would easily deal with the protagonists or isn't taking them seriously. However there's a limit as to how far you can push that arrogance and still remain plausible.

[Lord Revan]

I've actually been on board an actual military transport with actual real life military personel as the crew, sure it was a boat and not an aircraft but the same rules apply and even though said boat was on active duty carrying actual military personel as passangers (myself included) there wasn't a single weapon visible anywhere and it wasn't due that type being unable to mount any, it was because there was no need for weapons.

[Simon_Jester]

The hell of it is, the really stupid part of Archinist's hypothetical scenario is totally irrelevant to the setup. There's no obvious reason WHY everyone has to be flying out to the remote site in a military helicopter, as opposed to, say, a business jet. There's no reason why the pilot should be drinking. There's no reason why anyone would tolerate the aircraft being armed with machine guns. There's no reason why the flight that takes me to this wilderness chateau should be flown by a drunk, or why all the people with me act like a bunch of chavs.

None of this actually contributes to the story. Since the point of the story is "you're stranded, apparently alone, in an isolated wilderness with limited means of communication and travel."

Sure, eventually Archinist actually "gives" the reader some freedom of action, after literally a day and a night of following the rails of the story full of stupidity. But by that time, the reader already thinks "there is no way I would ever be in this hypothetical situation because I would have to be dumber than a parrot to end up in this situation in the first place." They've quit.

This makes it all the more silly that Archinist keeps piling on ridiculous, unlikely, and insanely reckless actions that are all part of the setup to the real action. All this other stupidity does is distract from the point. It gives people more things to laugh at.

And as I explicitly mentioned in my first response post, because of all this, I stopped paying attention to the scenario long before Archinist even got around to the "what do you do" part. Because things had gotten so ridiculous and stupid that there was no way I could actually imagine myself in the scenario. I can't even bring myself to think "what do you do if you wake up the next morning and everyone's dead or missing," the question Archinist meant to ask, because I can't bring myself to believe I would ever end up there in a helicopter flown by a drunk, while voluntarily seeking out the company of a bunch of chavs, one of whom is inexplicably wealthy and somehow hasn't lost all their money to lawsuits and crappy business decisions made because loldrunk.

[Bernkastel]

There are plenty of extremely wealthy people who still like to go outback and have some "good ol' fun". Maybe not by playing with military hardware and explosives, but that DOES happen actually quite a lot in movies, and I mean Until Dawn has magical phantoms and secret underground overrun bases. It's not exactly true-to-life, right?

Just because something isn't true to life doesn't mean it has to abandon any pretense of making sense. This is amongst the many things you are failing to comprehend.

Yep. This is important, Archinist. There is a reason why the idea of breaking a person's suspension of disbelief exists. Even when we suspend disbelief, it is usually only to a degree. There is still an expectation of logic and sense, though room is given for fantastical elements. But it is still expected that the work have a degree of sense to it.

Also, the degree in which people will suspend their disbelief depends on setting and characters. Having a scenario set in the real world or involving real people, such as ourselves, means the reader will likely not suspend their disbelief much. After all, you have people who are meant to be normal, so we expect them to act as such. Until Dawn, which as been mentioned, follows the horror movie model. This personally helps me with the story of that because horror movie characters often do not act like normal people. In fact, some can be be awful people. So, I hold them to low standards in regards to believability.

But, Archinist, you are creating a scenario involving us. Real people in the real world who act as such. You are also asking us what we'd do in your scenarios. That means you are asking us to immerse ourselves in the scenario and then analyse it in order to decide what we'd do. That means there's a high standard in regards to suspension of disbelief by default.