Single-Engine Ecureuil/AStar Pulls Off Amazing Touchdown

On May 14th, 2005 at 0708 (local time), a Ecureuil/AStar AS 350 B3 piloted by Eurocopter test pilot Didier Delsalle, landed at 29,035' on the top of the Mount Everest (Kingdom of Nepal).

This breaks the World Record for the highest altitude landing and take-off ever.

After taking off from its base camp Lukla on May 14th, 2005 at 9,403' Delsalle's AS350B3 reached the top of Mount Everest. As required by the FAI, the aircraft remained on the ground, stationary, more than 2 minutes on 'the top of the world' before flying back to Lukla.

This feat was renewed the day after.

Delsalle commented, "To reach this mythical summit definitively seemed to be a dream; despite the obvious difficulties of the target to be reached, the aircraft demonstrated its capability to cope with the situation…, sublimated by the magic of the place.”

During the trial period, Didier Delsalle and his Ecureuil/AStar AS350 B3 flew some rescue missions on behalf of the Nepalese authorities demonstrating the operational capabilities of the aircraft used to set the altitude landing and take-off World Record.

This feat has been achieved further to various flight tests begun one year ago with the Ecureuil/AStar AS350 B3 among which:

• Experimental flight up to 29,500' in April 2004 in Istres (France),
• “Time to climb” records to the heights of 3,000, 6,000 and 9,000 meters performed on April 14th, 2005 in respectively 2 minutes 21 seconds, 5 minutes 6 seconds and 9 minutes 26 seconds. These records smash the previous ones held by an Ecureuil/AStar AS350 B1 with respectively 2 minutes 59 seconds, 6 minutes 55 seconds and 13 minutes 52 seconds,
• Experimental flight up to 33,500' on April 14, 2005,
• Landing at the South Pass of Mount Everest at 26,000' on May 12th, 2005, establishing a new altitude landing and take-off record, previously held by a Cheetah helicopter (a variant of the Lama) - at 25,150'.

To date, 3,670 Ecureuil/AStar have been sold worldwide and logged 15 million flight hours. 424 Ecureuil/AStar AS350 B3 are currently in operation worldwide.

Upon this achievement, Eurocopter thanked the Nepalese government and all its departments for their help and friendly support throughout this mission. These world records have been submitted to the official approval of the FAI.

FMI: www.eurocopter.com