Like all born-again aviators, I consider low flying (“flat-hatting,” “dusting off,” “buzzing”) illegal, immoral, immature and possibly fattening, but, gee whiz, it’s still kind of sad that creative contour flying has gone the way of venturi tubes and ashtrays in the instrument panel. Maybe the daredevils who didn’t prang themselves all went west. Or maybe the current crop of pilots is too spooked by cell towers, wind generators, citizens paranoid about flight patterns and the growing alphabet of regulatory agencies that create and enforce regulations.
Among the oldest and most sacred rules of the air is the one about staying in the middle of it. As you would expect, I obey these commandments as religiously as the ones Moses came up with and avoid the edges, especially the upper one that borders interstellar space. But if it’s a day when I haven’t broken a rule and some attractive nuisance beckons, like a perfect bridge or Walt Davis driving his tractor when I’m flying the T-6, I hear Clarence Wilson’s voice echoing out of the past: “If you have to do it, then do it once and get the hell out of there — nobody gets a number or even an accurate description on one pass.” Now Clarence was chief of the Cincinnati FAA office for many years, back in the days when … and after my 28-year stint investigating low-flying complaints, I can tell you he was right.
