AeroPlus good point. Didn’t they operate ATRs on public transport there, and presumably withdrew the service for economic or incidental damage reasons? There may be in the French files a whole bunch of performance charts plus special procedures which governed the service.
Edit for video clip of a Tyrolean Dash 7
They did have a commercial service flying into Courchevel but that stopped. If you ever visit Courchevel ask to go into the tower and ask the controller for the picture album with the accidents. They keep a photo book of all the accidents and it is really impressive and sad of course to see all these crashed. But … it doesn’t stop people from flying in there and … not alone. They bring the family.
Courchevel unsafe and comparable to Locher? I respectfully disagree.
Courchevel LFLJ, like Peyresourde LFIP where I used to fly a lot, has a standard 3-degreeish final approach path (500-700fpm at usual airspeeds despite the higher TAS/GS due to altitude).
Because of that you feel significantly in control during the flare although once on very short final it is obvious that there is no go around. To me, however, the biggest challenge for a safe outcome with such a slope and short runway is judging the (3+8 degree) flare vs the usual 3, as you also have little runway length to err on touchdown point. Energy dissipates very quickly during the flare which avoids floating but also makes things happen in shorter order and with much more engine power into play than usual. Failing the flare usually results in pranging pride, airplane and pocket, but not health (I have not seen the pics of Courchevel but have seen those of Megeve and Peyresourde).
I see that as a higher risk than that of an engine failure precisely in the last few seconds of the approach when you have no options (what are the chances?).
As to take-off, unless engine failure occurs relatively early in the roll (you will anyway not release the brakes before you are happy your engine is developing good power, right?), rather than aborting, you would be better off gliding off the end of the runway at 50 KTS and quickly accelerating to flying speed at 0G then landing at one of the pre-briefed pastures 3000ft below at the bottom of the valley (or maybe find out during the ensuing 3-min descent that you set the mixture or the fuel selector incorrectly…). Due to terrain sloping quickly down and away from you, your options are much better than on many flat-terrain airfields where an engine failure immediately after take off will simply and very quickly put you in the trees.
In summary, although maybe more spectacular, if you respect trained procedures and wx minima, altiport flying at LFLJ and LFIP is no more unsafe than many apparently harmless flat-terrain GA airfields with few abort options immediately after take-off.
Locher, however, seems to require 3000fpm (vs 700fpm) on short final as seen in one of the videos and that is a big difference. Anything over 1000fpm on short final brings a lot of physics into play…(OTOH you dont need to worry about engine failure, or do you? 
) Also, although I am not familiar, your outs on departure appear scarce in the videos.
Don’t any of you that have done the French mountain rating or the site qualification at these places have a similar experience?
The -3500 fpm is not until the flare. The VSI needle pointing straight down is -2000 fpm in the PC12 and I would estimate he is at less than -1000 fpm in the last portion, then even less before the flare. I have seen PC12 flying into more challenging bush strips in Africa and then even carrying tourists on a commercial flight from Johannesburg.
@Snowbirdxx: can you share some loght on the airfield? It seems that you are flying from the same grass strip as the PC12.
what_next wrote:
Believe me, I mind mind own business almost all the time. But this guy is – out of his own will! – showing the whole world what a superhero womanizer pilot he is by posting his stunts on YouTube. And by doing so, he must be aware that this will attract not only applause.And yes, at work I am one of those “…deep inside the flight envelope within the narrow range of maneuver that delivers smooth and safe rides to the passengers…” because that is exactly what they pay me for. The deeper inside the envelope, the better. After a smooth ride, one usually gets a better tip.
Flying itself means increased risk and is, apart from technical factors, mostly dependent on the pilot’s personal envelope of limits and experience. I do not believe there is a possibility to objectify the risk level merely out of the fact of a difficult runway condition or setup. It is always on the personal level, and that pilot may well be as experienced and practiced in approaches and takeoffs from Locher airfield, as you are on a 5km concrete runway. I find it rather encroaching, condescending and respectless to rate someone as a “womanizer pilot hero” performing “stunts”, without ever having met that person. On the contrary, it might be that this particular pilot has better mastery of his PC12 than you have in your plane when being “deep inside the envelope”, which you seem to be putting into the center of the universe. Lets just assume this pilot has an own brain and used it, without your help, to think about whether he should be taking passengers in and out of his airfield.
Just saying…..
Flying is not always meant to be from concrete, flat runways. Somehow a large number of pilots survive daily, flying from similar airfields. I don’t understand why all of them are being judged as heros, or why it should be forbidden to post videos on youtube.
As I said earlier, I don’t think anybody has any issue with posting a video on youtube which shows the great utility value of a PC12. At the risk of stating what to me looks obvious, it is the message in the particular video which suggests the pilot is being rather casual about the whole thing and doing it with passengers who also don’t look like the world’s best assessors of risk. Probably quite a bit of group/peer pressure going on, too, because getting people to pose for pics which will be all over youtube is not that easy. I have not met a single woman who would have agreed to that. And there is a huge correlation between people who run their life casually and people who get into sticky situations – as one might expect.
Like I said, the pilot might be brilliant but the video doesn’t give that message.
RobertL18C wrote:
The precision engineered PC12 has around 3 million joules to dissipate in the event of aborting and running out of a decent stop way.Jacko’ s perfectly suitable off piste Maule has only around 220,000 joules.
Hopefully we can all process this in our risk assessment of operating out of a steep gradient grass strip with no stopway.
Of course, however there is a lot more to a risk assessment for a flight than that. Jacko’s piston engine is a lot more likely to stop at or just after take-off leaving Jacko with… no options. Did you take that into account?
Also Jacko’s Maule climbs out above those mountains a whole lot more slower than the PC-12, meaning you’re in the risk zone for longer… particularly if the weather isn’t CAVOK. It’s also more sensitive to wind gusts, turbulence and shears.
The risk balance may not be as bad as you think it is.
Thanks for your help Archie, I thought it might be worth a try, but it didn’t work. 
I put all those arguments in favour of lengthening our runway, extending our hangar, stealing a fuel tanker and buying that nice PC12 full of blondes to Mrs J, but she said NO. It was even a rather emphatic negative, accompanied by the look that means “verboten”. :(
Where did I go wrong? Should I have offered to sell the Maule?
EuroFlyer wrote:
I find it rather encroaching, condescending and respectless to rate someone as a “womanizer pilot hero” performing “stunts”, without ever having met that person.
I probably didn’t meet him personally. But I grew up in one of the richest provinces of northern Italy and therefore I am a bit biased towards these “look what daddy just bought me and see what I can do with it” guys. A very nice girl in my class at school was killed by one of those posers, without the slightest consequences to him. Quite a few well known entrepreneurs lost their life in flying accidents. It may be a cultural thing.
Maybe I am doing this man injustice and if so, I have no problem apologising to him personally. But I can judge only from what I see in the videos he posts (once again: out of his own free will and god knows for what purpose?) on YouTube. I don’t like what I see there and only make use of my right as a free man to say that.
NB: You don’t know me and you don’t know him. Whom of us would you ask to fly your daughter?
I don’t see a logical relationship between flying skills and YouTube posting. That’s beyond me :)
I would let my daughter fly with both of you. I would let her fly with him from Locher and from your airport. But with you not from Locher.
