A Nigerian Air Force Mi-24 Hind attack helicopter
ABUJA, May 13 (Xinhua)
The Nigerian Air Force on Monday released the preliminary report on the investigation into the recent crash of a Mi-24B helicopter, linking it to tail rotor systems failure. The crash occurred on May 9 at the Nigerian Air Force Base in southern Port Harcourt city.
Spokesperson for the Force Air Commodore Yusuf Anas made the report,
citing a team of safety and engineering
investigators. The engines of the helicopter and the gearbox were in good serviceable condition at the time of the accident, he added, noting that the report said mechanical machines are occasionally subject to failure as a result of system’s malfunction.
The report also confirmed that the
helicopter had flown 1,908 hours before
the accident. Following the crash of the helicopter, the chief of air staff, Air Marshal Alex Badeh directed the grounding of the entire Mi-35P and Mi-24B helicopter fleet. Anas said following the probe, the Mil helicopter fleet has now been certified fit to resume flying.
Beegeagle's Blog 
Good call… 🙂
Well, we only ever knew the NAF to own Mi-24V Hind E with twin 23mm cannons in the nose and Mi-35P Hind F attack helicopters with twin 30mm cannons on the right side of the fuselage.
My choice of this photo stems from my belief that, this Hind, armed with what is clearly not the twin 23mm cannon, is almost certainly the precise airframe which crashed.
Is that a quad-barreled 7.62mm weapon?
But the Hinds stationed at NAF’s 97th (?) Special Operations base, PHC are the very first Mi-35P Hinds (twin-barrel 30mm canons with the bright green camouflage body work). Those are the ones I see on the airbase’s ramps, and flying training sorties over the skies of PHC.
If the tail rotor had failed, then the helicopter must have gone into auto-rotation. ‘that the pilots were able to walk away relatively unscathed is a testament to their flying skills and NAF’s training program for assault helo pilots. Well done.
its a gatling style 12.7mm gun. the old variants were 12.7mm, before the introduction of 23mm and 30mm cannons with greater lethal capabilities.
@ocelot, NAF need to reverse back to the much tested and highly efficient combat training of the 80s. eastern europe training are not nearly as ‘standard’ as what the veterans got when NAF still had air worthy fleet. ground hugging was the niche then
kudos to the crew, they did a fine job, at least they wouldn’t be manning flight desk since the report confirms machine failure rather than human error. they get to fly another day!
@ freegulf, I’m not sure NAF adopted Eastern European training doctrine. Yes some of our pilots may have trained in places like Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia, but I think it may have been more of type-ratings. I’m pretty sure ours must’ve been drawn from the good ole RAF.
Yeah Freeegulf, I thought about the 12.7mm first but the barrels are so tiny that I believed it to be 7.62mm.
A Mi-24B then for sure…one of a kind though but a good one at that for close air support with minimised impact such as cannot be said for the 23mm and 30mm cannons.
Gentlemen, things are going to get very violent in our COIN operations shortly. I expect that, without further delay, the FG ramp up the numbers of attack and transport helics. I am sure that we can get those in within sixty days.
We need about 20 MBB-105s, eight more Mi-24V and eight Mi-17s. We really can roll in all of that from Germany, Russia and Ukraine stocks for $90 million and with upgrades too, by or before August 2013. During our Civil War, we got our first squadron of MiGs from East Germany within sixty days. So did Ethiopia when they acquired eight Su-27s in 1998.Russia have a cascade of Mil helics in storage.
Indonesia have similarly been severally lampooned on account of HR rights abuses supposedly committed by defence and security forces. So lately, the Dutch have been hiding behind that to stall on the small matter of supplying tanks to Indonesia.
Germany, to which I have said we should turn for decomm F122 frigates and MBB Bo-105s, have just approved the sale of 130 Leopard 2A4 and 2A6 tanks from German surplus stocks for $280m. The sum includes upgrades for the 2A4 tanks to the 2A6 variant.
Nigeria can continue to sleep on the job of simply reaching for the F122 frigates and Bo-105s. After all, we would rather run after those who are keener on demeaning the essence of our sovereignty than buy and walk away with our dignity intact.
Tellem Beeg.
OGA oceloot2006, I quite agree with beeg. I stay in PHC also, the mi-35p and this MI-24b that crashed sometimes conduct joint patrols. Although the MI-35p flies more often than the MI-24.
I’m sure oga beeg’s assertion is correct.
STATE OF THE NATION address @ 7pm nigerian time
………… wherever they may go,we will hunt them down ……… .Am looking forward to hot pursuits and surgical airstrikes on terrorist den’s/stronghold’s in neigbouring countries .
marshal beegs, it might be a smaller caliber MG. however, i have never come across any mi-24 armed with 7.62 gatling style MG. although there might be some out there, but i haven’t seen any. the older mi-24 had the 12.7mm which was good enough in some theater, was far more abundant in past conflicts, but nothing beats the heavier 23mm and 30mm cannons.
@ocelot, yea most of the mil pilots had to go for type rating and conversion training in eastern europe. however, a lot still need to be done when it comes to local training of gunship crew. yes, NAF established solid pilot training from NAF, it was a good precedence, but currently, Training Command has been unable to reach the standard set guidelines in training air crew.
23s and 30s will be overkills if hilux and landcruisers with AAs are the target. If they are 7.62 multi-barrel heavies, fine by me if u’re not attacking hardened targets.
As for the accident, I remember reading some where that in the afghan war of the 80s, the soviets hinds crashed a number of times when carrying out excessive maneuver which resulted in the main rotor twisting and running into the tail rotor. Same with the mil mi 28 havoc crash of some high ranking russian airforce general in 2012 or was it 2011 in the caucuses? I’m thinking if a new rigid composite blades(with d nos of blades increased say from 5 to 6 for the main rotor) for the main and tail rotor could be designed. The benefit could be less blade twist crashes, more maneuverability, greater lift and lower acoustic signature, the later perfect for pop up attacks?
While we are talking helic crashes, any word on the A109 crash?
The investigation on the fatal Navy A-109 LUH crash has long been concluded. Cause was pilot error.