Remarks: How's That Look?

Remarks: How’s That Look?

Frank Bowlin

Tuesday, December 22, 2020 at 08:59 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

Pilots are prone to occasionally stretching regulations or common sense, even for seemingly minor reasons, which can lead to serious consequences.
An example of a non-CFI teaching his son to fly illustrates how well-intentioned actions can violate aviation regulations regarding flight instruction and logging time.
The article advocates for a "reasonable person" test: consider how actions would appear in an accident report to determine their legality and appropriateness, as circumstances can reveal illegal activity regardless of explicit rules.

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Sometimes we stretch the regulations, or worse, common sense. Some examples include VFR weather minimums (scud running), night currency, or even logging.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not advocating that. But who among us hasn’t occasionally stretched the speed limit on a lonely country highway or even a busy urban commute, or committed some equally innocent-seeming infraction of the FARs we generally try to follow? We’re human; it happens to us all, even though our self-image might say otherwise. Ask pilots featured in this issue’s annual “Stupid Pilot Tricks;” most probably didn’t see anything wrong until, well, it went way wrong.