GA Hitchiking??

Capt.Crash'n'Burn

Capt.Crash'n'Burn

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Capt.Crash'n'Burn
Given how ridiculous airport security is these days, if one wanted to travel by air, but didn't own a plane or have a PPL, are there airports where you could just cruise around, find someone who's headed your way, then chip in for gas money?

I know this is probably stupid, but I find the TSA's new rules so offensive, and a violation of the 4th, that an alternate to airline travel needs to be found. :dunno:
 
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I've done it once to get home after a rental decided it wanted to try to kill me. I also gave a few air-hitchhikers a ride which was good fun.

Of course that was years ago when flying was fun before everyone went paranoid scared of their shadows gustappo on everyone else.
 
Done that once from Flagstaff, AZ back to the Bay Area.

It was February, so guy with a 182, his wife, and a friend had to land at FLG unexpectedly the night before due to flying into a snow storm. On approach, they also got carb ice, which probably scared the passengers :P

So he wasn't very keen to leave and asked me if I could take his friend who was also going back to the Bay Area. She seemed nice, so I agreed. Good flight!
 
I got weathered in at an airport about 35nm from home, so rented a car and drove home. The weather was forecast IFR all week, so I asked my brother to help me return the rental the next day. A week later when the weather cleared, I hung around at the airport hoping for a ride to pick up my plane.

I rode in the right seat of the next plane that took off.
 
I did it once. Had a backfire in the 182 knock the induction system hose off. When I got her started she sounded like hell. I managed to get a ride back home with a really nice guy in a B36TC with a bunch of glass in the panel.
 
I think it's time to lobby for commercial pilots to be able to offer some limited services (say 12 seats or less) in a "lesser airline" situation, say in optimal weather conditions. Would solve a whole lot of issues, and the threat from a six seater is a LOT less than that of an airliner. If a charter company could actually advertise for it's return flight, the whole thing would be a LOT less expensive.

Ryan
 
RyanShort1 said:
I think it's time to lobby for commercial pilots to be able to offer some limited services (say 12 seats or less) in a "lesser airline" situation, say in optimal weather conditions. Would solve a whole lot of issues, and the threat from a six seater is a LOT less than that of an airliner. If a charter company could actually advertise for it's return flight, the whole thing would be a LOT less expensive.

Ryan
Click to expand...

:thumbsup:

My thought exactly! And you don't have to have your junk fondled by a TSA goon!
 
Isn't there a website that offers pilots info on trips from other pilots going on hops??
 
We picked up some hitchhikers today......




















But they were from our own company. :)
 
I was once asked to take some hitchhikers from Cat Island to Nassau. I had my certificate less than a year, and wasn't willing to do that in a rental plane in a foreign country. Sorry. :(

Plus, if we're doing much of that, it makes it much harder to say to the TSA when they propose regulating small GA planes that we know our passengers.
 
I've picked up "real" hitchhikers at least a couple times that I can remember; once on the return to base after a mapping flight and once after 9/11 with the permission of the passengers. Everyone was trying to get home, or at least close.
 
Should the idea of people hopping rides with GA become popular, you can bet the TSA will be all over us like cheap suits. The commercial carriers will have a cow about losing passenger to GA, and start pressuring Congress to do something about it.

This is an area where we would want to be awfully discreet about engaging in such activities. Should people get it going on my space or some such thing, where they are telling people to go to GA airports to hitchhike rides, it could spell our doom.

John
 
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