palani
8th December 2011, 09:15 AM
Back when I took up flying (while I could afford it) a friend gave me a 30 year supply of AOPA magazines. This is a story I remember fondly from one of those issues:
The FAA showed up at an airport on a complaint that a student pilot was taking skydivers up with him. Students are prohibited by FAA regulations from having passengers.
The student was just landing with an empty plane after having just discharged a load of parachute nuts when the FAA guy approached him. What he told the FAA was sufficient for them to agree that he had broken no regulations.
The story was .... he was indeed taking up skydivers but one of them was a licensed pilot. The licensed pilot occupied the right seat (co-pilot position). While the licensed pilot was in the plane he was technically in charge of it and could carry passengers. The licensed pilot was the last skydiver to leave the plane which left the student pilot on a legal solo flight within the scope of his license.
A bystander who was observing this would conclude that the student pilot was in violation of regulations. The bystander was most probably a licensed pilot himself. Turns out he was a snitch as well. A lot of pilots are like this. They turn into agents very quickly so are little different from the general run of humanity.
The FAA showed up at an airport on a complaint that a student pilot was taking skydivers up with him. Students are prohibited by FAA regulations from having passengers.
The student was just landing with an empty plane after having just discharged a load of parachute nuts when the FAA guy approached him. What he told the FAA was sufficient for them to agree that he had broken no regulations.
The story was .... he was indeed taking up skydivers but one of them was a licensed pilot. The licensed pilot occupied the right seat (co-pilot position). While the licensed pilot was in the plane he was technically in charge of it and could carry passengers. The licensed pilot was the last skydiver to leave the plane which left the student pilot on a legal solo flight within the scope of his license.
A bystander who was observing this would conclude that the student pilot was in violation of regulations. The bystander was most probably a licensed pilot himself. Turns out he was a snitch as well. A lot of pilots are like this. They turn into agents very quickly so are little different from the general run of humanity.