A helicopter pilot reported the wing of a transport was towed over his rotors during engine start.

Narrative:

We were called out for a scene flight today. As I walked out to the aircraft I saw a transport being towed down the taxiway at our 8 o'clock position. If it continued down the taxiway it would pass behind us with plenty of room to spare. As I started the helicopter; the nurse yelled at me to abort the start. I did so and looked up and saw the transport coming right towards the helicopter at our 5 o'clock position. He had passed behind us and turned left down the taxiway on our right side. He was still 20-30 ft away at this point and he came to a stop. There were no obstacles on the other side of the taxiway and he had approximately 100 ft clearance on that side. I restarted the helicopter and as the ng reached idle speed; I looked up and saw the transport moving past us. His wing was at least 6-10 ft over the yellow line. The nurse then told me that his wing had crossed over the top of our slow turning rotors during the 2nd start sequence. The nurse said that he was afraid to tell me abort again in case the rotor blades jumped or moved when I hit the rotor brake. He said it looked like the blade cleared by about 6 inches. At this point the transport was clear and moving away from us. I continued the flight with no other problems.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A helicopter pilot reported the wing of a transport was towed over his rotors during engine start.

Narrative: We were called out for a scene flight today. As I walked out to the aircraft I saw a transport being towed down the taxiway at our 8 o'clock position. If it continued down the taxiway it would pass behind us with plenty of room to spare. As I started the helicopter; the nurse yelled at me to abort the start. I did so and looked up and saw the transport coming right towards the helicopter at our 5 o'clock position. He had passed behind us and turned left down the taxiway on our right side. He was still 20-30 FT away at this point and he came to a stop. There were no obstacles on the other side of the taxiway and he had approximately 100 FT clearance on that side. I restarted the helicopter and as the Ng reached idle speed; I looked up and saw the transport moving past us. His wing was at least 6-10 FT over the yellow line. The nurse then told me that his wing had crossed over the top of our slow turning rotors during the 2nd start sequence. The nurse said that he was afraid to tell me abort again in case the rotor blades jumped or moved when I hit the rotor brake. He said it looked like the blade cleared by about 6 inches. At this point the transport was clear and moving away from us. I continued the flight with no other problems.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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.

Attributes
ACN	849239
Time
Date	200908
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	SEA.Airport
State Reference	WA
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Helicopter
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Taxi
Aircraft 2
Make Model Name	Commercial Fixed Wing
Flight Phase	Taxi
Person 1
Function	Captain Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Events
Anomaly	Conflict Ground Conflict Critical Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy