Narrative:

We received a scene call request to [the] county. Air communication told me that the lz (landing zone) was at the intersection of two highways. Before reaching the coordinates; I realized that the call was in the mountains at 10;000 ft MSL and not in the city. This made me a little uncomfortable having never performed this kind of off-airport landing before. I made a slow pass at 500 ft AGL over the lz. After checking for obstacles; I determined that the terrain had a slope steep enough that I needed to land facing upslope to protect the tail rotor. I continued my reconnaissance pass with a plan to turn around and approach the lz facing up-slope. As soon as I turned; I saw that I was very close to the lz. This caught me by surprise because I have done this type of tear-drop turn several times since I started in this industry. I quickly reconnaissance figured the helicopter for a standard steep approach. The helicopter seemed twitchy but I decided this was due to mountain turbulence. As I continued my descent; a horn sounded. My first thought was a low rotor RPM issue so I gently lowered the collective and applied back pressure on the cyclic. When I glanced at the nr (rotor RPM) gauge; it read 400RPM. The horn stopped so I continued my descent. The horn sounded again and I found that I had run out of right pedal. At that time; I finally realized my mistake. I had not performed a wind check on my reconnaissance pass. I was in a tail wind situation and running out of available power. As I was already turning to the left; I let this continue until I had turned 180 degrees. I maintained slight forward movement throughout the turn. At the completion of the turn; I had plenty of tail rotor authority and the fli (first limit indicator) was below the yellow arc. I gently initiated forward movement to attain etl (effective translational lift). I followed the valley until I had sufficient velocity (vy) to climb out. At that point; I told my crew that I was not attempting another landing at the crash site. With the ground crew begging us over the radio to land; we decided to find another landing zone. We found a huge field at the bottom of [the] hill and landed there. The medical crew grabbed their gear and found a ride up to the crash site. The remainder of the mission was completed without issue.as a crew; we have extensively debriefed this flight and determined the following issues:1) my crew and I were uncomfortable with the scene but did not say so to each other.2) I did not perform a high reconnaissance3) I did not properly perform a low reconnaissance.4) I did not follow my personal scene-call procedures. Usually I am talking myself through the procedure; calling out all items on the list. I also require verbal consent to start the approach as a 'no' at 500 ft AGL is easier to abort than an 'oh no' at 50 FT5) I allowed a bad situation to develop further than I should have6) since my initial training; I have not re-familiarized myself with the different audio warnings7) I have little experience in mountain flying and less training. Flying over the ridges to various local hospitals was no training for landing in a mountain valley.during the debrief; we came up with the following solutions:1) follow the FAA and gom (general operations manual) directives. The rules are there for a reason2) the crew needs to speak up when they are not comfortable. The crew felt the approach was rushed but said nothing3) at the first sign that something is amiss (the first horn); abort the approach.4) complete a mountain flying course. I am signed up for an online course through iat.government. However; actual mountain flying training would be appreciated.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A helicopter pilot reported that they were unable to land on a highway intersection due to a tailwind and irregular landing zone.

Narrative: We received a scene call request to [the] County. Air communication told me that the LZ (Landing Zone) was at the intersection of two highways. Before reaching the coordinates; I realized that the call was in the mountains at 10;000 FT MSL and not in the city. This made me a little uncomfortable having never performed this kind of off-airport landing before. I made a slow pass at 500 FT AGL over the LZ. After checking for obstacles; I determined that the terrain had a slope steep enough that I needed to land facing upslope to protect the tail rotor. I continued my reconnaissance pass with a plan to turn around and approach the LZ facing up-slope. As soon as I turned; I saw that I was very close to the LZ. This caught me by surprise because I have done this type of tear-drop turn several times since I started in this industry. I quickly reconnaissance figured the helicopter for a standard steep approach. The helicopter seemed twitchy but I decided this was due to mountain turbulence. As I continued my descent; a horn sounded. My first thought was a low rotor RPM issue so I gently lowered the collective and applied back pressure on the cyclic. When I glanced at the NR (Rotor RPM) gauge; it read 400RPM. The horn stopped so I continued my descent. The horn sounded again and I found that I had run out of right pedal. At that time; I finally realized my mistake. I had not performed a wind check on my reconnaissance pass. I was in a tail wind situation and running out of available power. As I was already turning to the left; I let this continue until I had turned 180 degrees. I maintained slight forward movement throughout the turn. At the completion of the turn; I had plenty of tail rotor authority and the FLI (First Limit Indicator) was below the yellow arc. I gently initiated forward movement to attain ETL (Effective Translational Lift). I followed the valley until I had sufficient velocity (Vy) to climb out. At that point; I told my crew that I was not attempting another landing at the crash site. With the ground crew begging us over the radio to land; we decided to find another landing zone. We found a huge field at the bottom of [the] hill and landed there. The medical crew grabbed their gear and found a ride up to the crash site. The remainder of the mission was completed without issue.As a crew; we have extensively debriefed this flight and determined the following issues:1) My crew and I were uncomfortable with the scene but did not say so to each other.2) I did not perform a high reconnaissance3) I did not properly perform a low reconnaissance.4) I did not follow my personal scene-call procedures. Usually I am talking myself through the procedure; calling out all items on the list. I also require verbal consent to start the approach as a 'NO' at 500 FT AGL is easier to abort than an 'OH NO' at 50 FT5) I allowed a bad situation to develop further than I should have6) Since my initial training; I have not re-familiarized myself with the different audio warnings7) I have little experience in mountain flying and less training. Flying over the ridges to various local hospitals was no training for landing in a mountain valley.During the debrief; we came up with the following solutions:1) Follow the FAA and GOM (General Operations Manual) directives. The rules are there for a reason2) The crew needs to speak up when they are not comfortable. The crew felt the approach was rushed but said nothing3) At the first sign that something is amiss (the first horn); abort the approach.4) Complete a mountain flying course. I am signed up for an online course through IAT.GOV. However; actual mountain flying training would be appreciated.

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.