On February 13, 1997 Philip Stevenson was flying his Hiller helicopter in the Ochoco Mountains of Oregon.  He had two passengers.  One was May, from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW).  The other was Dave, from the U.S. Forest Service.  Both were wildlife biologists whose purpose there was to count elk.

Dave was aboard that day as a replacement for another man from ODFW.  That agency required its personnel to wear helmets with short, rigid cords.  The helmets were necessary to make communication in the noisy helicopter possible.

Dave, however, was obstinate, and a bit of a rebel.  He didn’t like the uncomfortable helmet mandated by ODFW.  “I’m not supposed to be here anyway,” he reasoned, so he donned a more comfortable headset—one with a long cord.

Dave’s presence that day, and his decision to wear a headset with a long cord, ultimately saved three lives.

Dave was nervous about flying in the helicopter.  He was afraid of heights.  Through his headset he questioned Philip about the helicopter.  Philip reassured him, and told him what a safe machine it was.

The helicopter carried fuel for a flight of 2 ½ hours.  Before that time had expired, it would be necessary for Philip to find Ellen, his wife, who constituted his ground crew.  Ellen was in a pickup pulling a trailer holding the tank from which Philip periodically refueled.  At each refueling he and Ellen would agree on the next rendezvous spot.  While Philip was making his flight, Ellen would drive to the next rendezvous site.

On this particular occasion it had been 2 hours since Philip had left on his last flight.  Ellen was beginning to get nervous.  She got out of her pickup and walked around.  She couldn’t hear the helicopter.  All she could hear was what was probably a plane way off in the distance at an altitude of possibly 10,000 feet—much too high for a helicopter.

A few minutes before, Philip had been flying down a canyon.  He pulled up on the stick to make the helicopter rise.  Nothing happened.  The stick was limp.  Through the clear bubble that enclosed them, Philip saw a linkage above and to his left fall from its position, and slop down on the bubble.

“Folks, we’ve got a problem,” Philip announced into the headset.

May and Dave were reluctant to believe it.  To all appearances the helicopter was flying just as it had been for the previous two hours.  It took Philip several minutes to convince them that they, in reality, were about to die.

During those minutes of explanations, Philip was trying everything he could to stabilize the situation.  When the linkage had come undone, that allowed the blades to tilt to full pitch.  With the blades at that angle, the helicopter could only go up.  There was no way to get down.  At an air speed of 50 miles per hour, the helicopter was rising at the rate of 1250 feet per minute.

Philip pulled the rpm’s of the blades down as low as he dared, but the helicopter continued to ascend.  He poured all of the ‘copter’s energy into forward speed.  At 100 mph the helicopter’s ascent was slowed to the rate of 150 feet per minute.

Philip tried to think of a survivable way to crash the helicopter.  Below them were trees and mountains.  They were now above the highest peak.

All of the options available were bad.  If they continued to rise, the carburetor would ice up, the engine would stop, and they’d drop like a rock.

If Philip would adjust the throttle ‘way down, the helicopter would become like a floating maple leaf and crash.

Auto-rotation was the best bet.  When a helicopter malfunctions in flight, even if the engine stops, a pilot can still set it down by using auto-rotation.  The blades need to be at flat pitch, however, for auto-rotation to work.

Philip’s blades were tilted clear back.  The only way to get them to flat pitch would be for someone to climb out of the bubble, stand on the cargo rack, and manually pull the blades down.

Philip explained the plan to Dave, telling him, “We’re going to die.  Maybe we can save it if you get out there and do this.”

Dave thought about it briefly and replied, “Yeah, I can sit here and die, or else I can go try to do something.”

There was no panic on anyone’s part.  Dave swallowed his fear, and eased out onto the cargo rack.  Wearing his headset with the long cord enabled him to hear Philip’s instructions.

“Pull it down gently,” Philip instructed.  “Gently, gently.”

The blades dropped to flat pitch ‘way too fast, causing the helicopter to drop incredibly fast.  They were falling at terminal velocity.  Philip couldn’t believe that Dave managed to hold on.

Dave released his hold on the linkage, and the blades went back to full pitch.  He crawled back inside where he shook and shivered.  He was freezing cold.  The wind outside had also blown the contacts out of his eyes.

Auto-rotation wasn’t going to be possible.  The only other hope would be for Dave to go out again and use something as a pin to put the linkage back together.  A search was made for a suitable pin.  The pin of the fire extinguisher was settled upon.

Dave again crawled out onto the cargo rack carrying the fire extinguisher.  He pulled the pin, pitched the fire extinguisher overboard, tried to insert the pin, determined that it was the wrong size, pitched the pin overboard, and got back into the helicopter.

What Dave was trying to accomplish was an impossible task.  His job was to pin three pieces of linkage together which included a vibrating arm with a ball joint.  Those three pieces would need to be lined up perfectly and be pinned with something of the proper size while he fought the wind, cold, and his virtual blindness caused by his missing contacts.

It was an impossible situation, but their only hope.  The helicopter was still rising.  It was almost out of gas.  The gauges showed that ice was forming in the carburetor.  Philip had to fly in a manner that would keep him out of clouds.  Clouds contained moisture, and would also cause him to lose his perspective of what was up and what was down.

A mad search was made for a suitable pin.  May unzipped the first aid kit.  In doing so she exhibited the first signs of panic.  Things flew everywhere.  There was nothing there.

They tried pulling the pins from the foot pedals.  They were too big.

They found a Leatherman in the seat cushion.  Armed with the Leatherman, Dave got out of the helicopter for the third time.  He tried to insert the Leatherman’s screwdriver, but couldn’t make it fit.  He tried again and again.

Dave got back in.  They had now been wrestling with the situation for 25 minutes.  They knew the time because when Philip had first announced the problem, May looked at her watch.  She’d thought to herself, “If we’re going to die, I want to see how long it takes.”

Dave shook and shivered.  He was hypothermic.  For the fourth time he crawled out.  Philip watched over his shoulder as Dave tried to control the shaft and get the ball joint in the right position.  Through sheer determination and good fortune, he willed it into place.

The linkage was pinned.

Dave stayed where he was, holding the Leatherman’s screwdriver in place.  Philip brought the blades back to flat pitch and began descending.  Below him he saw a bare patch of snow on a ridge where there were no trees.

He landed the helicopter.  They were out of gas.  Dave was frozen.  But they were on the ground!

At the beginning of the episode Philip had considered calling Ellen to tell her goodbye.  Instead he called her and said, “I’ve lost my collective, and I’m almost out of fuel.  Say your prayers, Mama, say your prayers!”

Ellen got out of her pickup and walked around.  It was then that she heard what she supposed was an airplane far in the distance and very high.  It was actually Philip.

“I’ve already said my prayers,” Ellen thought.  “Everything will be all right.”

“Vaya con Dios” had been the last words she’d said to Philip as he’d boarded the helicopter for the flight.  It was a ritual between them.  “Vaya con Dios”—“Go with God”—was their watchword.  It was even emblazoned on the caps that they wore—along with the name of their business—Sundance Helicopters.

For the next half hour she knew nothing of her husband’s fate.  She could only pray, walk, listen, and watch the sky.  There was nothing.

Finally, over the radio, came Philip’s welcome voice.

“We’re on the ground.”

Back on the mountaintop Philip found the bolt which had fallen out of the linkage.  He reinserted it.  The bolt had a hole in its end.  He put a safety pin into the hole, got everyone back into the helicopter, and lifted off with his almost empty tank of gas.

“Don’t take your eyes off that pin,” he told his passengers.

They flew back to Ellen, and got Dave into the warm pickup.  Philip wanted to fly Dave to a hospital, but Dave refused.

Philip refueled, and put two nuts on the offending bolt before he flew home.

Since the lock nut on the bolt had failed, Philip had to file a Malfunctioning Defect Report with the Federal Aviation Administration.  The filing of that report had two results.

One was that all Hiller helicopters had to have castellating nuts put on that bolt.

The other was that Philip and Ellen were fined $2000 because Philip had not been qualified to put those nuts on the bolt.

Philip was flying again two days later.

Dave recovered from his hypothermia and the terror of his experience, and told Philip, “I want you to take my son for a ride.”

The episode was run on a computer.  The computer determined that Dave shouldn’t have been able to do what he did.  He’d have had a better chance of winning the lottery.

But, then, God could probably care less about the lottery.