The key US ally had sought the suspension of all non-emergency V-22 Osprey flights over its territory after one fell into the sea on Wednesday in western Japan.
Until the cause of this one is determined, the only V-22 crash that wasn't pilot error was due to a maintenance error where a mechanic wired the controls backwards.
Pilot error is rarely the actual cause, but is a convenient scapegoat. I worked in rotary accident investigation in the Army and that’s not something you’ll read in a report. There’s other issues; why is this aircraft in particular so prone to pilot error? Perhaps it’s poorly designed?
It's because it's a heavy rotorcraft. Not poor design, just rotorcraft physics. It's prone to enter a vortex ring state if the descent rate in relation to forward velocity is too high. The same thing can happen with any normal helicopter, but the V-22 has a lot of weight for the disk area of it's rotors, giving stronger vortices from the rotors.
It's a pilot training thing, but I think they did put some sort of alert system on it if it's getting close to the conditions that induce VRS.
Yes, but slower and less range than fixed wing. Likewise, it can’t do rotary wing things as good as a helicopter. It’s truly a “master of none” aircraft. It’s not great at anything.
Putting it in a rescue role is a terrible idea. You do not want a finicky to fly, unreliable aircraft in that scenario.