I am asking because where I live, there is a helicopter (I guess owned by the police) that makes frequent patrols.
Judging from the sound, it seems like it is hovering over the same spot for about 10-15 minutes, then changes its position, stays there for another 10-15 minutes and so on.
It is rather noisy and sometimes it will go on patrol very late in the night-early in the morning. Waking up at 3:00 from the constant humming of a heli makes me wish I had a Stinger missile in the house.
I know that cars are subject to noise regulations. Is there a similar thing for helicopters?
In the U.S. aircraft are subject to noise regulations. I used to fly out of Santa Monica (California) Airport. Back in the 1920s when it was built, it was named Clover Field. This is because it was in the middle of a huge field of clover. The only neighbour was a large (plant) nursery. Over time, people decided that it would be a good idea to crowd houses around the airport. Now they are shocked – SHOCKED! – that there is an airport next to their homes! Due to concerns that an airplane will fall on their houses (it’s happened on occasion) and noise, residents who bought a house near the airport and now complain that they’re living near an airport try periodically to have it closed. :rolleyes:
In order to quell some of the complaints, there are some noise reduction rules in place. Instead of being allowed to climb straight out, aircraft taking off to the west must “dog leg” over the golf course. Some aircraft are required to reduce power (on climbout! :rolleyes: ) to reduce noise. Incidentally, most of the noise from an airplane comes from the prop; the tips of which can approach the speed of sound.
When landing a helicopter at SMO, we had to maintain pattern altitude (I don’t remember what that was; helicopters were effectively bannished from SMO and the operation moved to Van Nuys where I did most of my flying) untill crossing Ocean Boulevard. Now, this is very close to the landing area (on the taxiway; not the runway); so you almost had to autorotate to get down.
So yes, there are local regulations that are enforced by the FAA concerning aircraft noise, including helicopters. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out the situation is similar in the UK.
Now there are execptions to every rule. I lost a lot of sleep because of police helicopters orbiting my neighbourhood for a couple of hours. And I like airplane noise. There’s not much you can do about them. They’re a government agency. Privately flown helicopters don’t generally hang around a small area for a long time anyway. They generally have someplace to go. So the rules do little, if anything, to curb noise from civilian helicopters because the helicopters generally don’t stay in one place long enough to be a nuisance. The rules do little, if anything, to reduce the noise from police helicopters, since the police helicopters are generally excluded from the rules.
I know your location says “Between Greece and the UK,” but by the sound of your OP you must live just around the corner from me in Baltimore.
One of the constants in this part of the city is the police helicopter doing low-level sweeps at night, often with a searchlight, and obviously either looking for suspicious activity or actively chasing some crime suspect. Sometimes they just circle the same two or three blocks for ages.
I have no idea what the answer to the question is, but it reminds me of the joy that I felt when I learned that the Washington, DC government went into super-double dog fiscal emergency some years ago and had to sell its Metropolitan PD helicopter(s?) to other police departments. The sales, and the subsequent peace and quiet during the wee hours, relieved me of a long-held belief that I had a landing pad on the roof of my apartment building.