I think that I busted Bravo today

Tom-D said:
It will certainly place you under the microscope, When no one noticed the violation, I really doubt the tapes still exist. Now you want him to jump up and tell the world he screwed up?
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You don’t seem to understand how these work. They are anonymous and don’t trigger an investigation. And it’s run by NASA for safety not the FAA.


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ASRS data are used to:

  • Identify deficiencies and discrepancies in the National Aviation System (NAS) so that these can be remedied by appropriate authorities.
    Do you really want to go there for nothing. ?
 
Tom-D said:
ASRS data are used to:

  • Identify deficiencies and discrepancies in the National Aviation System (NAS) so that these can be remedied by appropriate authorities.
    Do you really want to go there for nothing. ?
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I’m confused by your comment. They identify discrepancies in the *system*, not in pilots...

A get out of jail free for an inadvertent bust which could also help other pilots down the road isn’t nothing.

Our medical system is so good in part because of the practice of confidential non punative post mortems. It’s a good practice.


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You can go to liveATC.net and check the tower transmissions. If you hear "there is an idiot inside class B squawking VFR", or if you hear airliners instructed to go-around, you better file a NASA form.
 
sarangan said:
You can go to liveATC.net and check the tower transmissions. If you hear "there is an idiot inside class B squawking VFR", or if you hear airliners instructed to go-around, you better file a NASA form.
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As well as the CTAF from where ya took off to see how easy it would be to track ya down.


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tspear said:
File the NASA form.
What is included I the form can NOT be used against you.
Mention the altitude and put in subject that bravo leaves you below obstacle clearance requirements.
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The reason I said not to put the altitude in the header is that the header is publicly visible and could draw attention to the intentional 91.119 violation. You are correct, I believe, that what is in the body of the form cannot normally be used against you, but what if the violation is considered intentional? In that case, if the OP were violated for the Bravo bust and tried to use the report as a get-out-of-jail card, he would be giving them what they need to connect the body of the form to him, and in that case I'm not so sure that they couldn't use it against him for action on the 91.119 violation.

If that's not correct, then disregard what I wrote, but I believe it is.
 
Banjo33 said:
I don’t fly helicopters, so I don’t know. Are the rules different for them? Or are they just enforced differently?
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I don't either. But see 91.119:
Sec. 91.119

Minimum safe altitudes: General.

Except when necessary for takeoff or landing, no person may operate an aircraft below the following altitudes:
(a) Anywhere. An altitude allowing, if a power unit fails, an emergency landing without undue hazard to persons or property on the surface.
(b) Over congested areas. Over any congested area of a city, town, or settlement, or over any open air assembly of persons, an altitude of 1,000 feet above the highest obstacle within a horizontal radius of 2,000 feet of the aircraft.
(c) Over other than congested areas. An altitude of 500 feet above the surface, except over open water or sparsely populated areas. In those cases, the aircraft may not be operated closer than 500 feet to any person, vessel, vehicle, or structure.
[ (d) Helicopters, powered parachutes, and weight-shift-control aircraft. If the operation is conducted without hazard to persons or property on the surface--
(1) A helicopter may be operated at less than the minimums prescribed in paragraph (b) or (c) of this section, provided each person operating the helicopter complies with any routes or altitudes specifically prescribed for helicopters by the FAA; and
(2) A powered parachute or weight-shift-control aircraft may be operated at less than the minimums prescribed in paragraph (c) of this section.]
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azure said:
I don't either. But see 91.119:
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That’ll do it.

Wonder why the exclusion? Maybe the expectation is that they’ll go straight down (or minimal lateral drift) if they have an issue vs an airplane will go in more laterally and less vertically? I can see the weight-shift and PP exclusion.
 
Tom-D said:
ASRS data are used to:

  • Identify deficiencies and discrepancies in the National Aviation System (NAS) so that these can be remedied by appropriate authorities.
    Do you really want to go there for nothing. ?
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You are ridiculously misconstruing that verbiage. You may want to reread it as well as other sections of the webpage.

When a pilot, mechanic, ATC, or any other person files a report unde ASRS, a few things happen with the information/data. First, all PII is stripped out. Then at least two things are done with the data.

One, it is entered into a searchable database where it can be retrieved and used for trend analysis. The form has numerous forms boxes to check or gill in. All of these become fields in the database. So if someone wants to do trend analysis on a certain airport, facility, airplane type, etc. they can do so.

Two, the individual report is analyzed to determine if an immediate threat to the NAS exists and if so, what is the best course of action.

What does not happen is the report being sent to the FAA with all of the submitter’s identifiable information so that the FAA can take action against the individual. The only way that the FAA will know that pilot Joe Cool filed a report is if they find out about the incident/potential violation by other means and pilot Joe takes advantage of the portion of the program where the FAA takes it easy on them for submitting a report and informs the FAA that he filed.

That is my version of “ASRS For Dummies” which is about my level of understanding of the system. :(

Take it for what it’s worth.
 
Are you Adsb-out equipped? If so then they know who you are already.
 
Tom-D said:
It will certainly place you under the microscope, When no one noticed the violation, I really doubt the tapes still exist. Now you want him to jump up and tell the world he screwed up?
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No. Read the references I posted. Please stop giving out poor information. Your credibility is bad enough as it is.
 
azure said:
The reason I said not to put the altitude in the header is that the header is publicly visible and could draw attention to the intentional 91.119 violation. You are correct, I believe, that what is in the body of the form cannot normally be used against you, but what if the violation is considered intentional? In that case, if the OP were violated for the Bravo bust and tried to use the report as a get-out-of-jail card, he would be giving them what they need to connect the body of the form to him, and in that case I'm not so sure that they couldn't use it against him for action on the 91.119 violation.

If that's not correct, then disregard what I wrote, but I believe it is.
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I may be wrong, but I read it as he ducked down there to avoid the class b. The OP can clarify if I read it wrong.

To clarify my response, he may have thought being in the Bravo airspace worse than ducking low. The ASRS form may indicate some education is needed- busting the Bravo is worse than hitting something.
 
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Cap'n Jack said:
I may be wrong, but I read it as he ducked down there to avoid the class b. The OP can clarify if I read it wrong.
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That's my reading too. The question is whether the feds would consider that an "intentional violation". It was certainly a deliberate act, wouldn't you say? AFAIK the only FAR that gives you authority to violate another FAR is 91.3, and then only in an emergency. Could the OP argue that the Class B constituted an emergency? I suspect that argument wouldn't fly, but IANAL.

Bottom line, I'd leave out the altitude information, or consult an aviation lawyer before submitting the ASRS form.
 
azure said:
That's my reading too. The question is whether the feds would consider that an "intentional violation". It was certainly a deliberate act, wouldn't you say? AFAIK the only FAR that gives you authority to violate another FAR is 91.3, and then only in an emergency. Could the OP argue that the Class B constituted an emergency? I suspect that argument wouldn't fly, but IANAL.

Bottom line, I'd leave out the altitude information, or consult an aviation lawyer before submitting the ASRS form.
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Yes, it was a deliberate act. But like Corey Lidel, he acted to avoid a different violation.

I’d tell what I did , and why I did it. As it is anonymized, the information is still useful for educational purposes. Or maybe they do like they did for the Lidle incident and change the airspace. In this case, he seemed to exit the airspace as quickly as possible, but did so in the wrong manner. Perhaps a lesson is not to kill your self to avoid busting airspace.
 
azure said:
That's my reading too. The question is whether the feds would consider that an "intentional violation". It was certainly a deliberate act, wouldn't you say? AFAIK the only FAR that gives you authority to violate another FAR is 91.3, and then only in an emergency. Could the OP argue that the Class B constituted an emergency? I suspect that argument wouldn't fly, but IANAL.

Bottom line, I'd leave out the altitude information, or consult an aviation lawyer before submitting the ASRS form.
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I believe you only have 10 days. I would look that up.


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Cap'n Jack said:
Yes, it was a deliberate act. But like Corey Lidel, he acted to avoid a different violation.

I’d tell what I did , and why I did it. As it is anonymized, the information is still useful for educational purposes. Or maybe they do like they did for the Lidle incident and change the airspace. In this case, he seemed to exit the airspace as quickly as possible, but did so in the wrong manner. Perhaps a lesson is not to kill your self to avoid busting airspace.
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Agreed. I think an ASRS form is a good thing to do, as you put it, for educational purposes. But as I said, I would keep any admission of a 91.119 violation in the body of the form and I wouldn't use the report as a get-out-of-jail card. You're probably right that the worst he would get if they took action against him is a stern lecture, maybe a 44709 ride at the worst. But he already knows, I suspect, that ducking down to avoid the Bravo was unsafe and giving the feds the ammunition to take whatever action they decide to take won't help his situation. Besides, you never know what they would decide to do, and certificate action is always possible if you get an inspector who is hell bent on exacting a pound of flesh.

@gsengle : I think you are right. The OP can always ask for a telephone consult, that can usually be had in short order. When a FSDO ASI called me about a declared emergency, I had no fewer than 3 phone consults with local aviation attorneys in the next 3 days. It's all up the OP, of course.
 
I'm pretty sure that I busted Newark Bravo today. But I'm not sure because I couldn't see the Ipad due to glare. . . . I was supposed to make a sharp 80-90* turn to the right (SE) to avoid it. But I made about a 30* turn and continue straight . . . . So I was literally dodging a couple of towers and had to split 2 hills at about 200 AGL. At one point thought about just climbing and intentionally busting Bravo to stay safe. I knew there was no actual danger from Newark as the planes were behind me (4L/4R), so it would've just been a technicality.
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And we're arguing about how ASRS works?
 
azure said:
The reason I said not to put the altitude in the header is that the header is publicly visible and could draw attention to the intentional 91.119 violation. You are correct, I believe, that what is in the body of the form cannot normally be used against you, but what if the violation is considered intentional? In that case, if the OP were violated for the Bravo bust and tried to use the report as a get-out-of-jail card, he would be giving them what they need to connect the body of the form to him, and in that case I'm not so sure that they couldn't use it against him for action on the 91.119 violation.

If that's not correct, then disregard what I wrote, but I believe it is.
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I believe you are correct, they read these and make a decision " was it intentional?" And then some bureaucrat has you at their mercy.
 
azure said:
The OP can always ask for a telephone consult, that can usually be had in short order. When a FSDO ASI called me about a declared emergency, I had no fewer than 3 phone consults with local aviation attorneys in the next 3 days. It's all up the OP, of course.
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Why did you feel the need to consult with attorneys after declaring an emergency?
 
To answer somebody, this isn't a hypotheical or a troll, it happened and now I'm trying to decide as to my next course of action if any.

I think checking the Newark tower tapes would be a good start. I was on Linden CTAF. But I seriously doubt that I would have caused any kind of a conflict. I was at about 750 and the Newark is 4 miles away. And I was about 2 miles east of the final for 4L/R and low.

I checked and the plane is not equiped with ADS-B, just a 430 WAAS.

One lesson I did learn not to be dependent on the magenta line, because if it fails or whatever where it's not accessible, you still gotta know where the hell you are going.

Another thing that just came to mind is that when I was talking to Kennedy and they would give me a squak and identify me, the altitude they read back to me was always about 200 feet lower that indicated. (I did have the correct altimeter). It's possible that the same would happen on newarks radar and they wouldn't even notice me busting by 50-100 feet. I know radar is not that exact.
 
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azure said:
...The OP mentioned that he was under 500 AGL (just reread #1) so he was in fact cruising that low. I have to wonder if that was the (unspoken) reason for his conundrum, wanting to choose between filing an ASRS and the fact that it might incriminate him of violating another FAR. In that case, I agree - in this particular instance, filing an ASRS might not be the wisest thing to do. I can't think of a way to narrate the whole incident without admitting to a 91.119 violation in order to avoid operating further in the Bravo, and that violation would probably be construed as intentional...
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Looks like he was over water (the ocean actually) when he was below 500...if that was the case, I can't see a violation for that.
 
Also, what is the penalty of an unintentional Bravo bust? What about low flying?
 
orange said:
Also, what is the penalty of an unintentional Bravo bust? What about low flying?
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Accidental Bravo bust, depends a lot on your interaction with the FSDO. If you have submitted an ASRS, and aren’t acting shady about it. Own up to your mistakes and the ASI feels you have learned your lesson, you may just get a talking to, maybe told to get some refresher training on airspace. With an ASRS and no indication you did something intentionally negligent, the worst you’d see is a note in your FAA airman record, but no action taken against your certificate.

As far as low flying....was it actual illegal low flying? 500 feet or lower over open water is not illegal. 500’ over houses or a crowded beach is illegal.

If the later, I would expect certificate action such as a suspension for a defined period of time. It’s hard to say in an ASRS that you ‘accidentally’ flew too low over a crowd of people.
 
Fearless Tower said:
Accidental Bravo bust, depends a lot on your interaction with the FSDO. If you have submitted an ASRS, and aren’t acting shady about it. Own up to your mistakes and the ASI feels you have learned your lesson, you may just get a talking to, maybe told to get some refresher training on airspace. With an ASRS and no indication you did something intentionally negligent, the worst you’d see is a note in your FAA airman record, but no action taken against your certificate.

As far as low flying....was it actual illegal low flying? 500 feet or lower over open water is not illegal. 500’ over houses or a crowded beach is illegal.

If the later, I would expect certificate action such as a suspension for a defined period of time. It’s hard to say in an ASRS that you ‘accidentally’ flew too low over a crowd of people.
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As soon as FSDO starts a dialog with you, you are on defense.

He has gone this long and no one has contacted him, he's home free. IF ----- Anyone contacts you Monday, Deny - Deny- Deny. Make them send you the registered letter. When you don't roll over for them, it is a waste of time. If they can't prove the violation, they won't try, they got bigger fish to fry. If they can prove the violation, they would have made the contact by Friday.
 
orange said:
This happened yesterday afternoon.
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If you aren’t ADS-B equipped, departed from an uncontrolled field and landed at an uncontrolled field, then if they wanted to pursue it, they’d need to pull any CTAF audio tapes and correlate the timing of your radio calls with the radar track, or have someone at the FBO be able to identify you. They could track you down, but it takes some effort and like I mentioned earlier, they are literally swamped right now just dealing with the daily PDs from the RUUDY 6.

If there was no lost separation, and it isn’t obvious to them who you were, there is a good chance they’ll never find you.

But, it still wouldn’t hurt to submit an ASRS.

Just say you were focused on avoiding lateral airspace boundaries/obstacles and inadvertently ascended into the Bravo. Then include a recommendation on how you or other pilots could avoid making that error in the future.
 
Fearless Tower said:
Why did you feel the need to consult with attorneys after declaring an emergency?
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I didn't declare, ATC declared for me when I told them I was making a precautionary landing (my exact words) because a fuel gauge was reading hard empty. The gauge was working again by the time I landed, plus the airport was deserted except for the trucks ATC had rolled for me, so I did a quick check and pre-flight and took off again. I consulted attorneys on the advice of my CFII, who guessed that the inspector was trying to bust me for taking off with a known defective gauge. As it turned out, he was basically right: the conversation was more of an interrogation and the main focus was my actions, why I didn't call a mechanic right away, whether the gauge was working when I departed, etc.

That's the short version, I've posted the details several times before if you're interested. Anyway that experience is part of why I'm a lot more cautious nowadays about giving the FAA evidence that might even be interpreted as incriminating.
 
tawood said:
Looks like he was over water (the ocean actually) when he was below 500...if that was the case, I can't see a violation for that.
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I can't tell from the sectional shot he posted, but looking at a close-up view from within ForeFlight (basically the TAC), it's pretty clear that the 70/05 sector would have begun over land. I think the Bravo floor is even at 1300 by the time you get over water. If he didn't go below 500 AGL until he was over water, then I agree he has nothing to worry about from 91.119.
 
Tom-D said:
As soon as FSDO starts a dialog with you, you are on defense.

He has gone this long and no one has contacted him, he's home free. IF ----- Anyone contacts you Monday, Deny - Deny- Deny. Make them send you the registered letter. When you don't roll over for them, it is a waste of time. If they can't prove the violation, they won't try, they got bigger fish to fry. If they can prove the violation, they would have made the contact by Friday.
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Terrible advice. ^^^^

Submitting the NASA form helps to show a "proper attitude". Doing as Tom D suggests will just get them more inclined to pursue an action, in my opinion. @Fearless Tower gave you good advice.

Tom-D said:
Saturday? hold your breath till Monday.
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They may wait until Monday too.
 
File the ASAP. File an ASAP for anything and everything that you may have done wrong... but file it within 10 days.
Anyone who says otherwise truly is just not aware of how the system works.
 
azure said:
I didn't declare, ATC declared for me when I told them I was making a precautionary landing (my exact words) because a fuel gauge was reading hard empty. The gauge was working again by the time I landed, plus the airport was deserted except for the trucks ATC had rolled for me, so I did a quick check and pre-flight and took off again. I consulted attorneys on the advice of my CFII, who guessed that the inspector was trying to bust me for taking off with a known defective gauge. As it turned out, he was basically right: the conversation was more of an interrogation and the main focus was my actions, why I didn't call a mechanic right away, whether the gauge was working when I departed, etc.

That's the short version, I've posted the details several times before if you're interested. Anyway that experience is part of why I'm a lot more cautious nowadays about giving the FAA evidence that might even be interpreted as incriminating.
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Understand. I can see wanted to talk to a lawyer first in a situation like that.

Very different from my experience, but I officially declared an emergency/squawked 7700 and left the plane once I landed and haven’t heard a peep out of anyone.
 
Don't incriminate yourself on the NASA form by writing Busted Bravo on the top of the form. Instead write something like Airspace Confusion.
 
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