George,
I guess you and I do not see eye to eye
on this subject. I say it is a dangerous and you say it is not. The FAR's and
AIM do not agree with you nor condone this kind of flying and the Navy did not
either. Flathatting is addressed in OPNAV 3710. If you were a squadron CO
and saw one of your JO's doing this at your local NAS would you (a) slap him on
the back and say "well done" or (b) put him in "hack"? Probably (b).
Not everyone agrees with you including
the FAA around here as well as some of your brethren Lancair types. Here are a
few replies I got in the past few days from folks on the LML.
Lancair CFI ---"The best thing about the
LML is it lets me know who has the decision making skills to actually be flying
these aircraft and who should be flying a powered parachute. There are reasons
why at airshows all fly bys are limited to “At or Above 500’ AGL” even if you
have a F.A.S.T. ticket."
Another one...
"Well reasoned and
well said. And thank you for putting it on the net.
It really galls me to see someone do a high speed
pass and to hear others
bragging about doing it - under the guise of
"checking the runway...". I
live on an air park and see it all the
time."
There have been five serious or fatal Lancair
accidents that can be attributed to pilots deliberately flying very low
over the airfield, house or even the desert. One involved an airline pilot
that killed himself and his daughter. His NTSB summary is quoted here...."The
airplane dove into a residential property adjacent to the pilot's residence in
near-vertical flight. Neighbors believed the pilot intended to fly over his home
to alert his wife prior to landing at the nearby airport. The neighbor, in whose
front yard the airplane crashed, reported there was a brief whining sound before
the crash. When he opened the front door, the wreckage was in his front yard
within a few feet of the house."
I have always recommended in this forum that people
fly safely, responsibly and within the regulations. Brent Regan says,
"don't let your kid fly the airplane," and if you have seen his presentation
this is clearly one of those cases. A couple of years ago I had a running
"discussion" with a builder/ flier that thought the airworthiness regulations
did not apply to him because he could troubleshoot problems from the cockpit.
Within a year he was killed after he took off with a known engine problem and
the engine quit. He failed to fly the aircraft correctly and ended up
short of his divert field. In short, he did not want, need, nor heed all
the great advice he got from many other pilots and instructors. Shannon Knoepflin is missed by many folks on this list.
There have been ten fatalities in Lancairs in the
last 12 months. Many of the accidents were related to poor decision making-- the
very subject we are addressing here. I make no apologies for my tone when
I see pilots bragging about doing stupid things on this list that only
serve to encourage others to try the same stupid stunt. In short, all of
us should get "condescending, preachy, etc," when someone here says "gee I'm
bored flying this machine, let's go out and do something really stupid and fun
and kill ourselves".
Regards,
Jeff Edwards
LIVP N619SJ
www.avsafe.com