Anything new on the Westwind Helicopter accident last week?

preliminary may shed some light 

that is how the GOM works. You do it or you don't.

What happened to the "Beach in 30 minutes before sunset" rule?  

unless you tell me where you found that rule. you also don't know what time the accident was

it was for fuel

Here it comes: Back in my day...

There are a couple of "beach" issues in terms of GOM flying. Most operators require that while flying offshore, their pilots must maintain enough fuel onboard to fly back to the beach (shoreline) and then continue for 30 more minutes. This is called "Beach+30." It means that if you mess up and get totally I-IMC out there (or get a transmission chip light), you can point the compass to the "N" and fly until you hit shore and then still have enough fuel to find an acceptable place to land, even if the "beach" is also fogged-in, which sometimes happens.

Obviously, carrying enough fuel to fly back to the beach and then again for 30 minutes is burdensome and can limit the payload if you're going offshore with a heavy load in a 206 (maybe not so much in a 407). If we were going way out, us old-timers sometimes had to take just enough fuel to get to the first offshore fueling platform, tank up and then hop-scotch our way out to wherever we were going, always trying to maintain "beach+30."  It was tough sometimes, balancing payload with required fuel. Must've been tough when PHI only operated Brantly B-2Bs back in the day.

The exception having to maintain "Beach+30" was if you are offshore in a "field" of numerous platforms where one of them has fuel.

The other "beach" thing is that most operators want their single-engine ships to be passing over the shoreline ("beach"), inbound to their shore-based destination 30 minutes prior to sunset.  We call this "downtime." Also, you had to be at your onshore destination no later than sunset. Helicopters that were based offshore had to be done and shut down at "downtime."

For 135 operators, these procedures are spelled-out in their respective GoMs. Part-91 operators can do what they want. A company called Taylor Energy, which owned their own 206L, used to fly offshore at night all the time. Big balls, those guys.

We don't know what WW's particular policies are regarding fuel and "downtime."  And no, we don't know what time the WW 407 crashed, only that they reported it to the Coast Guard at 1835 (and yeah, it was already pretty dark). With modern flight-following procedures and equipment, we can 'assume' that it happened pretty close to then, but who really knows.

*Oh, and just kidding about the transmission chip thing. If you get one of those, you probably want to be looking for a big platform to set down on - one with a big quarters building and hopefully a cook! And Oh#2, I don't think PHI ever operated the Brantly, but I could be wrong.

has nothing to do with flying at night. There wasn't, and probably is not now, anything in PHI's GOM or OPSPEC about it. PHI used to do some flying at night in the 76. Panther and Mayeaux flew under part 135 at night and probably still do. Nothing about down time in the GOM either. Also, the beach plus 30 rule only applied to certain weather conditions. 

I didn't say anything about OpSpecs, only that things are spelled-out in the Ops Manual, not all of which has to be FAA-approved.  And of course, single-engine night-135 work is not prohibited by the FARs.  However, the Ops Manual will specify when singles can operate.(e.g sunrise to 30 minutes prior to sunset offshore, generally).  Most Gulf of Mexico 135 operators did not allow any offshore night flying in singles when I was there. All the offshore 206/407/350 pilots would've had to be put through an approved night training program and be night current like their EMS counterparts.  PHI was very picky about not wanting/having to do that.  So yeah, there is kind of a difference between 135 and 91 flying. When I was at PHI, "beach+30" applied to all singles no matter what the weather.  If that changed, oh well. Of course, the twins did go offshore at night, even back then. 

The accident we're talking about here was a single. It now looks like it was some sort of pilot-health issue, but we are still interested to know what time this accident occurred, and what WW's single-engine policies are with respect to night flying? If the pilot had the presence of mind to pop the floats and try to land it, did he at least get a radio call off to Ops? 

We too at ICY were strict about all single's beaching in no later than 30 minutes before sunset, and it was a good policy since the false horizon would overlap the sky/GOM.  

there is NOTHING in the GOM about day or night flight or "down time". Also WRONG, everything in the GOMl has to be approved. PHI did not allow it but it's NOT written in the GOM.

A general operating manual is accepted. An AAIP is "approved". 

PHI was very "picky" about not training pilots for operations they did not conduct. lol 

a hero to me. 

Thats horrible!!

Always got to be prepared, for when your time is up.   Be right with your supreme being, tell your family you love them everyday.  RIP