Narrative:

I fly a helicopter [and] we are on a letter of agreement with rdu ATC to use 4 routes in and out of the airport. I was cleared to depart rdu on the echo (eastbound) route and was at 1200 ft MSL [when] tower advised they had traffic at my 11 o'clock and 1.5 miles at 900 feet. The 11 o'clock position declared by ATC was an everyday search as there are a lot of training aircraft that use 32 regularly; which is at my 11 o'clock as I'm flying eastbound. I thought 900 ft was a little low; but figured it was training. About 30 seconds later both radios went off; one was rdu suggesting I climb to 1500 ft for conflicting traffic and the other radio tuned to air to air helicopter frequency with [another helicopter] giving a traffic report. I had nothing on my tcad and relayed same to ATC and held 1200 ft still looking at 11:00 and had no aircraft in sight. This all happened very quickly. ATC then advised I was right over top of the other aircraft; I looked down to see [another helicopter] on final to land about 300 ft below me. I thanked [ATC] and cleared rdu class C; then called on the helicopter frequency for the [other helicopter]; but received no answer.I was able to get the phone number of the pilot and left repeated messages so we could discuss the incident but to date he hasn't returned my calls. Point echo is heavily used by helicopters and is close to the approach corridor for runway 32; I thought it would've been a good idea to come up tower and advise of his intentions even though he wasn't technically in the class C; he was on the very edge of it. At the very least use the air to air for the area and advise intentions; I don't believe he did either.I thought the tower was getting a false positive from their radar when they called; half the time when I'm entering the class C at point echo and at 1500 ft they can't see me; so I discounted their warning. I won't next time. Additionally; I will stack my radio volumes in order of importance so the priority radio is at a higher volume. Lastly; we're going to update all of the avionics next year to adsb.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Helicopter pilot reported a NMAC with another helicopter in the vicinity of RDU airport.

Narrative: I fly a helicopter [and] we are on a letter of agreement with RDU ATC to use 4 routes in and out of the airport. I was cleared to depart RDU on the ECHO (eastbound) route and was at 1200 ft MSL [when] tower advised they had traffic at my 11 o'clock and 1.5 miles at 900 feet. The 11 o'clock position declared by ATC was an everyday search as there are a lot of training aircraft that use 32 regularly; which is at my 11 o'clock as I'm flying eastbound. I thought 900 ft was a little low; but figured it was training. About 30 seconds later both radios went off; one was RDU suggesting I climb to 1500 ft for conflicting traffic and the other radio tuned to air to air helicopter frequency with [another helicopter] giving a traffic report. I had nothing on my TCAD and relayed same to ATC and held 1200 ft still looking at 11:00 and had no aircraft in sight. This all happened very quickly. ATC then advised I was right over top of the other aircraft; I looked down to see [another helicopter] on final to land about 300 ft below me. I thanked [ATC] and cleared RDU Class C; then called on the helicopter frequency for the [other helicopter]; but received no answer.I was able to get the phone number of the pilot and left repeated messages so we could discuss the incident but to date he hasn't returned my calls. Point Echo is heavily used by helicopters and is close to the approach corridor for runway 32; I thought it would've been a good idea to come up tower and advise of his intentions even though he wasn't technically in the Class C; he was on the very edge of it. At the very least use the air to air for the area and advise intentions; I don't believe he did either.I thought the tower was getting a false positive from their radar when they called; half the time when I'm entering the Class C at point Echo and at 1500 ft they can't see me; so I discounted their warning. I won't next time. Additionally; I will stack my radio volumes in order of importance so the priority radio is at a higher volume. Lastly; we're going to update all of the avionics next year to ADSB.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.