Landing a helicopter at Mom and Dad's house for Lunch 🚁

In 2004 I started to learn to fly helicopters with dad. We would push the helicopter out of dad’s hanger, pre-flight, and fly out of a little hole in the woods Mom and Dad call "Paradise." I was blessed to complete 40 hours of flight training with my father before life happened and pealed me away from training.

0:00 High Reconnaissance
3:40 Final Approach
5:20 Slow Motion Hover
6:13 Cool down
6:57 Proud Parents

In 2017 I was able to return to training and complete my Helicopter License and fly back to Paradise. I landed, mom had an amazing lunch prepared, we took off and did some local flying. It was just... and amazing day... It was very profound to return and fly in as a pilot, instead of a student. I had never flown with mom in a helicopter before, and to get to fly with her, especially as her pilot was a profound experience.

Landing at Paradise was a much different experience without Dad's steady hands helping on the controls... but, he was on the radio talking me in. As dad said, "that's a pretty small hole in the woods."

I am grateful to my dad for sharing his passion for aviation with our family and starting this fire in me. Being a father who is working to share helicopters with his family, I know how difficult, time-consuming, expensive and amazing it is to have a family that flies. I am thankful to my father for sharing his skills with.

I am also grateful to Garrett my flight instructor for BEATING confined area landings into my skull... I needed all the practice for this one…

First Student flight at Paradise: Thursday, November 25, 2004
First Stable Hover: Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Private Pilot License: Thursday, June 14, 2018
Return flight as Pilot: Thursday, July 12, 2018

Time Elapsed: 13 years, 7 months, 17 days

The Slow Motion Helicopter footage was shot at 120fps using a GoPro 6 with pretty stunning results.

For amazing instruction, a culture of safety, and ownership who empower your missions in flight, check out http://www.heartlandhelicopters.com. I cannot speak highly enough.

A funny side note here, I asked mom and dad if they would mind filming from the ground. When I discussed it with dad I said "of course, I'm going to come in on the best angle, and if we get something we can use. So be it." So they said it would be fun to let me ship them a camera.

I always use a "Set and Forget" mentality when filming around helicopters. I never want the camera to be part of the flight. It is too risky. And as I thought about that, I decided to just send them 3 new GoPros, some stands, some gear that I found helpful, etc. So in typical "Type A" personality mode my poor mom goes from "this is no big deal if you get some shots that would be cool," to "Here is a box with 3 cameras and a ton of gear." Needless to say, I had to reiterate that my goal here was to just have fun. It has amazed me how quickly a camera can change the dynamic of a flight. I am grateful to my mom and dad for dealing with all the crazy and setting up some amazingly beautiful shots on the ground. This memory would not have been captured without their efforts. There are some moments that take my breath away, like the shot over dads shoulder on approach, or the shot with me hover 30ft away from dad. For not planning out the shots, I think it turned out really well, and I am grateful for their hard ground crew work on that!

Видео Landing a helicopter at Mom and Dad's house for Lunch 🚁 канала Michael Hendricks