Helicopter facts...how much fuel does a heli burn a minute?

Question

A helicopter pilot told me last night when he landed during a storm in rush city reg. that the heli will burn 1.5 gallons a minute. I was wondering if that was true. He just said it, I never asked him what it burns. He was talking about running out of fuel and stuff during medivacs.

Answer 1

How long is a piece of string?

The fuel burn depends on the kind of helicopter. Here are some common helicopter types with their fuel burn in US gallons per hour:

Robinson R22 - 12

Robinson R-44 - 16

Bell 206 - 28

Eurocopter AS350B2 - 48

Bell 205 - 120

Answer 2

A helicopter burns on average 75 gallons and hour so that would be about 1.25 gallons a minute.

Answer 3

1.2 liters to be exactly it's a turbine engine so it's a gas gazzling

Answer 4

Depends on the type of helicopter and what it's actually doing, slow flight, hovering and take-offs use a lot more than cruising.

In the medevac roles, with much of the heavy-consumption manouevres already described, it could well reach that figure.

Various versions of the Bell 204/205 (the dear old Huey) beloved as a medevac aircraft will exceed that figure by a considerable margin!

Answer 5

To the extreme, an Erikson S-64 burns around 9 gallons per minute!