Unwarranted

One special category of pilots are those for whom going fast is important. Why? Because speed is relative. At altitude on a severe clear day, there's little sensation of speed. We have to get close to something before our speed becomes apparent. And the risk with getting close to something is we might hit it. While untrained pilots who engage in such risky behaviors aren't the norm, there's enough of them that the practice has its own term: unwarranted low flying. Its use apparently has fallen out of favor, but the phrase "unwarranted low flying" has populated numerous NTSB reports over the years.

Joseph E. (Jeb) Burnside

Thursday, October 03, 2019 at 12:00 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

Pilots engaging in "unwarranted low flying" risk serious accidents, a practice often documented in NTSB reports due to the inherent dangers of operating aircraft too close to terrain or obstructions.
A fatal Cessna 172M accident exemplified these dangers, where a pilot with a known habit of reckless low flying collided with power lines, with sun position and a river bend contributing to the inability to see and avoid the hazard.
Such incidents violate FAA regulations on minimum safe altitudes (FAR 91.119) and careless operation (FAR 91.13), harming personal aviation's reputation and underscoring the challenge of addressing dangerous pilot mindsets.

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Pilots fly for different reasons. For some, it’s a living. For others, it’s recreation or personal transportation. Some want to go fast to distant destinations; some want to go slow because they’re not going anywhere anyway. It’s not uncommon for pilots to want to do all of these things at one time or another.

There’s no question that personal aviation can be exciting. But the ways we make it exciting can be problematic. For example, launching into a thunderstorm qualifies as exciting, at least for a while. If you survived, you’d certainly have a story to tell. The same is true for, say, attempting aerobatics without training or depending on the autopilot in lieu of an instrument rating.