The distinctive deep, steady "thump, thump, thump" of a heavily loaded helicopter echoes through the tall Montana timber south of the town of Ennis.
Slowly, the white-and-maroon Bell 204 ascends above the treeline. Beneath the helicopter are 100 feet of heavy steel cable and a bundle of tree trunks weighing as much as two tons.
The helicopter is working in an industry that's still in its infancy — even though helicopter logging has been around for about 20 years.
Traditionally, logging was conducted by huge, ground-bound machines that left unsightly scars across the forests. In their haste to harvest the timber, operators often grazed nearby trees, causing damage that allowed access to insects and disease, causing the trees to die. At other times, good timber had to be left to rot because it was on a steep grade, across a river, or otherwise inaccessible to conventional machinery. Raw timber is a renewable crop, but gathering it is something else again.
The introduction of helicopters solved these problems. Because helicopter logging is cost-effective and environmentally sensitive, it is rapidly becoming the wave of the future. With helicopters, downed logs that were once irrecoverable can now be salvaged. Removal of these logs also eliminates a source of very combustible material from the forest floor. Once ignited by a source like lightning, this timber becomes fuel for dangerous crown fires that destroy everything in their paths.
Canusa Airlift, Incorporated, a helicopter logging firm that is based in Shelton, Washington, employs a medium-lift Bell 204. The helicopter has a 1,200-shaft-horsepower Lycoming T53-L-13 engine, compared to the 204's original 540-shp engine, explained Michael Scott, Canusa's operations manager.
A typical light-duty helicopter can provide only 1,200 to 1,500 pounds of lift, enough to haul only small logs. With more powerful engines and larger rotor systems, medium-lift helicopters like Canusa's will safely lift 2,000 to 4,000 pounds off the forest floor. Heavy-lift helicopters such as the Sikorsky 64 can lift 19,500 pounds, and the giant Boeing Vertol 234 Chinook develops a lift capacity of more than 29,500 pounds. To put it in perspective, more than 52 million pounds of logs were lifted in Alaska during one 30-day period, establishing a record in the Guinness Book of World Records.
A large bubble window in the pilot's door of Canusa's helicopter increases visibility, but the drag reduces cruise airspeed to 90 knots. The helicopter can fly at 120 knots in level flight with the flat factory door, said Robin Kennedy, Canusa's owner and pilot, who has more than 11,000 helicopter flight hours. "The fuel capacity for the 204 helicopter is 242 gallons, but we will put in only 70 gallons to enhance lift, and it allows one hour of flight, after which we set down for refueling, inspection, and rest," he said. Logging helicopters flown by a single pilot typically log eight hours of flight time per day; two-pilot crews average nine hours.
Those duty periods start early, too. Every morning, in a meeting before daybreak, the operations manager/safety officer reviews minute details of the day's operations. "It is critical that we work as a team to ensure that everyone involved with the daily tasks knows what's happening," said Scott, who is also Canusa's flight safety officer. "There are no one-man teams; we all rely on each other." Safety meetings are scheduled at least once a week to ensure that all issues are addressed.
"One of the concerns of this newly fledged industry is the importance of communication between the helicopter mechanic and pilot," Kennedy commented. The mechanic's preflight inspection begins before daybreak; the pilot's inspection follows.
"The helicopter logging industry has found weaknesses in some of the actual designs of the helicopters and provided sound solutions to prevent fatalities or other serious accidents," explained Dennis Krewson, Canusa's chief mechanic, himself a retired 23-year military test pilot. "An example of this is the 42-degree gearbox. This device transfers directional power from the turbine engine to the rotor. It was found to be deficient for the usage and demands of helicopter logging. A typical 42-degree gearbox averages six cycles per hour. The 30-year-old design did not provide for additional stress in an industry that at times requires some 40 cycles per hour." A cycle is a lift, moving the cargo and descending to drop it; the logs may be airlifted only a quarter mile or less.
The potential for mechanical failures in remote woodlands is one of the operation's challenges. "Because of the rural nature of our job, sometimes it's difficult to determine what you should bring to the job site for repair purposes," Krewson said. "We can be hundreds of miles away from a potential source of assistance and parts. When the helicopter is down, the job is down, and that begins to add big bucks to the costs." Often there are strict Forest Service or Bureau of Land Management deadlines to complete a job, and a helicopter that is not flying costs everyone.
Most of the logging operations are directed toward removing logs suitable for house construction. "There's no more pristine way of getting the timber out of the woods," said Krewson. "No additional roads need to be cut, and it's an environmentally friendly way of working with a crop of wood."
What's it like to sit in the driver's seat and take her for a spin, you ask? "Flying a one-man logging helicopter is having a lot on your plate," Kennedy said. "It's a job you love, and you become one with the helicopter. Being relaxed with it, everything else falls into synchronization. You always have to know where the blades are. The moment you go up, you have to know your environment, and at times you and your craft are placed in the 'dead man's curve.'" That curve, graphed in helicopter pilot operating handbooks, is an altitude/airspeed relationship below which, in the event of a major malfunction, a safe landing would not be possible. One of the greatest dangers occurs when pilots forget about their surroundings, forget where their tail rotor is, and allow the tail rotor to strike trees.
When logs are being airlifted, the pilot is like a director, choreographing the ground crew. In the cutting zone, sawyers cut the trees, and the hooker connects the logs to the lift cable with a shorter cable called the choker. At the drop site, delimbers wait to trim branches from the trunks, and loaders place the timber on trucks. Kennedy engages in guessing games with the ground crew, chiding them when they don't guess the exact weight of a load.
Now, the crew — and several tons of felled timber — await the helicopter. Kennedy climbs back into the Bell and straps in, ready for another hour of ups and downs. When you're a helicopter logger, it's all in a day's work.
A month after this article was researched and photographed, Robin Kennedy was killed when his helicopter experienced a structural failure and crashed during logging operations.
Jim Oltersdorf is a writer and photographer based in Salmon, Idaho, who specializes in outdoors subjects. He is also a pilot and owns a Cessna 150 — Ed.
