Helicopters... in layman's terms.

(A long while ago my friend asked me to explain helicopters without all the technical mumbo jumbo. I apologize to my fellow helicopter enthusiasts if this article does not reflect their lofty views of the greatness of helicopters.)

So all of us have at some point of time asked ourselves or somebody close by, "How does a helicopter fly?" Right? Wrong! That is what researchers working on helicopters ask all the time. The more normal people amongst us have only one question regarding helicopters, "Why is it so ugly?" To an average person, a helicopter looks like an oversized dragonfly with a hormone problem. Back in the 50s if helicopters were alive, they would make a perfect candidate to play the role of Godzilla's nemesis.

So what if they could hover motionless over a point? The fact is they are unromantic and normal people don't want anything to do with unromantic things. For example, we would all agree that one of the oft used pickup lines is "I am a pilot". Now how many times have you heard the response, "Ooh! Do you fly a helicopter?" Never! It is always "Oooh! Have you flown a jet?" At the end of the day, size and looks do matter and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

The difference between an airplane and a helicopter can be explained more easily using a swimming analogy. The airplanes glide through the air pretty much like fishes or trained swimmers do, while the helicopter beats about in air like a drowning person flapping his arms trying to stay afloat.

Aside: The curious amongst us might desire to know how to identify between a fish and a trained swimmer. It is quite simple actually. Look on their sides, if you see gills they are fishes, otherwise they are trained swimmers.

The smart alecs amongst us will be quick to point out that this test will fail to differentiate between trained swimmers and other mammals like whales and dolphins. Differentiating between blue whales and trained swimmers is trivial. The creature which can swallow the trained swimmer is the blue whale.

However, differentiating between a dolphin and a trained swimmer is more difficult. For this you will need a large ship, preferably named Titanic, Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio. Ask Leo and Kate to stand at the bow of Titanic which is cruising along at 20 knots (For added effect, you can ask Celine Dion to croon in the background). The creatures trying to jump out of the water playfully are the dolphins. The ones trying to crawl up the ship to get Kate and Leo's autographs are the trained swimmers.

So the fact is that helicopters do not know how to fly. Therefore, it is no surprise that so many of them fall out of the sky and crash. May be that is the reason why when someone says "I am a pilot" you don't hear the response "Oooh! So you fly helicopters?" because most helicopter pilots are dead.