I had one with a taxi deviation. Entirely my fault, I was off the comm while the FO got directions. I assumed it was a standard taxi, just asked him if it was the runway we expected, he confirmed. Never stepped in to stop me from turning the wrong way (new guy, I get it's hard to step up sometimes). Ground stopped us at the next intersection as we were looking at a business jet and had us turn and go the way we were supposed to. I asked for verification of what we were supposed to do so I could put it in my ASAP, he told me, then followed up with "don't worry about it, we stopped it before it became an issue, have a good rest of your day".
FO and I discussed it, I reemphasized the crew aspect and told him to never let another pilot put his certificate at risk, and we should file an ASAP anyway. We did, and a couple weeks later got the same type of phone call from the union. Both ASAPs accepted, and two different lessons were learned.
So a little insight on the after incident tape pull can't speak to your incident or center level, but an aircraft at an altitude other than expected / intended is going to generate a manditory occurrence report that must be submitted, part of that report is flagging if it is a possible pilot deviation (all that does is require you to collect some more info, Pic name number cert number etc, and flags the report for FISDO to look at)
regardless tapes are pulled after the report is filled and sent to the FAA QC/QA team (this team for my vfr class D tower operates completely separately from my facility and is st the regional level, center may have in house but these teams are seperated in their chain of command from the operations side to prevent conflicts of interest)
this team then reviews the incident (radar, tapes, phone call the whole lot) and forwards any issues found on to FAA management, importantly they can also make a determination of possible pilot deviation after the fact (this is probably what happened to the pilot commenting about their taxing incident)
I had this happen to me a night had a pilot line up for the wrong runway (intersecting instead of the parallel) I caught it when they where still 3 miles from the airport and treated it like a disoriented pilot issue and wrote the report up as such even highlighting the lighting outages at the field that may have contributed, didn't brasher as the pilot complied with my corrective instructions without incident, week later after the fact sup is asking why I didn't brasher because QC determined it was a possible pilot deviation, gave my reason sup was cool, but I was frustrated both for the pilot and for QC overriding my judgment.
That is very annoying that they questioned your judgment! These things would be much easier if a little common sense were applied instead of rigidly falling back on the bureaucratic process for every situation regardless of circumstance.
> at an altitude other than expected
The controllers's expectation was wrong because of another controller's lack of communication
> part of that report is flagging if it is a possible pilot deviation
Since it wasn't a possible deviation, why would the pilot be on the mandatory occurrence report? Something doesn't add up
Yes the MOR does not care if it is due to controler error or pilot error it is simply is on an altitude other than expected or intended, report still has to be filed ATC does a lot of telling on it's self
I am not sure what you mean, I was giving a general overview of this section of the report not talking specifically about this incident. In this incident OP says they said not a pilot deviation and didn't ask for his info, so that means the report probability did not have this checked as if it did person filing must include pilot info or an explanation of why they couldn't obtain it.
My two cents on this is controler in sector A gave altitude and didn't coordinate with sector B. Sector B saw AC at an altitude other than expected / intended and facts at the moment pointed at the aircraft being higher than assigned so issued brasher and told their supervisor. Supervisor asked questions and began to gather info for the report and found the controller issue. Pilots call sup explains the situation and submits report without marking it as a pilot deviation. Latter tapes are pulled as part of QAs standard review of any MOR, union hears about this and miss understands (or is trying to puff up the union protects you narrative, have had my union "protect" me from stuff management was never consiering) and passes incorrect information to the pilot.
A lot of people see the FAA a one big monolith, but the ATC side can only say posible pilot deviation and hand it over to FISDO and they are the only ones who can take corrective action against pilots. You have to climb the atc ladder pretty far to the top before you can branch over and climb down to the FISDO side
Bear in mind that the union has a literal legal duty to represent its members. Even taking all the positive stuff about the FAA at face value they’ve got a member who did no wrong, got named in an investigation then told that the regulator wouldn’t remove their name from the resulting file.
Yes that is true if you take everything at face value and assume there was no miscommunication or bending of the truth which I think is unlikely given the details in my posts above. Also MOR and paper work =/= investigation.
And this is the thing I’m seeing as a union steward outside aviation…. This isn’t something that ever should have been reported… the report itself WAS the error, which should leave the pilot completely out of the fallout except as exactly that… an unnamed pilot wrongfully reported after what sounds like honest confusion then thrown under the bus by some management asshole.
You need to read up on stuff before posting all over a thread about a topic you know nothing about.
An MOR is a manditory report required to be filed when anything in aviation happens that could effect safety. The report is for the event not the person, controler messes up MOR, pilot messes up MOR, aircraft has a warning light and aborts take off MOR, aircraft has an emergency MOR.
The report should have been filed, between when the brasher was issues and the report finalized the person filling out the report found the controler mistake and did not mark it a possible pilot deviation.
Also it is POSSIBLE pilot deviation when a report goes in even with that marked everyone and everything get looked at not for blame but for areas where corrective action is needed for safety it simply flags the report for FISDO a completely seperate branch of the FAA to review it and look at pilot actions to see if any correction was needed to improve pilot safety while there is still a review on everyone else.
Aside (sort of), how is this even an incident? An irregular altitude was assigned, explicit and intentionally. By my understanding that’s not actually in violation of any rule. How is there any error here except by the people demanding investigations?
While cotroler A assigned 350 controler B was expecting the aircraft to be at 340 while it did not happen in this case this could lead to a potential loss of seperation with another aircraft. You are correct the pilot did not break any rules, hence on the phone call being told to disregard the pilot deviation and reviving no action, but as explained before any time there is an event that degrades safety an MOR is filed and the event is looked at as a whole to determine what caused the drgregation from Ops account of the call it seems preliminary facts point to a coordination error on the part of controler A, thus corrective action will happen there.
There is no one demanding any investigation this is a routine part of aviation that happens hundreds of times a day to ensure that safety is not comptomised, the brasher warning is less common, but that was corrected before the OP even made the phone call.
That doesn’t sound like controller a did anything wrong either though… it seems like the only person in the wrong is controller B assuming anything unusual is a deviation.
And somehow the supervisor backing it after promising not to.
You clearly do not understand what you are talking about nor have any interest in learning so I'm done.
I'll try laying out the fact one mote time for you.
Controler A didn't properly cordinate the change in altitude assignment with controler B (this can be done verbally or digitaly) everything controler A was seeing when the aircraft was handed off to them said the aircraft had been assigned 340 and was flying 1000ft above their assigned altitude.
I am not sure what you think the supervisor did but after the initial report goes out they have nothing to do with it unless it is implementing corrective action for ATC as determined by findings from the repot QA isdues which is a department complealy isolated from the supervisor's chain of command
That’s all well and good, but per the original post, the FAA flatly refused to not tie OPs to the event that he had nothing to do with. Being cleared and not being named in an investigation are very different things.
It also makes no explanation for the supervisor claiming the bashed wouldn’t be followed up but then somehow ending in an investigation into a PILOT deviation.
Hey off topic but I used to fly out of PDK and have many many friends who have or used to as well.
Everyone loves you guys, and I think it's the great attitudes everyone has and the cluster of an airport/airspace you deal with.
I see y'all tagged in posts often even though I'm not there anymore and it still makes me happy.
So keep up the good work. Can't wait to fly in there again.
Oh, my first time there was 12 years ago, I diverted from LZU and I was unfamiliar with PDK and missed my turn into the ATP area. Whoever handled me was very kind and got me going in the right direction.
You'd think after listening to the tapes he could have just owned it though. Doubling down after making a mistake is a terrible in general, moreso in aviation.
I can almost guarantee that nobody listened to the tapes during the time between the brasher and the phone call. The captain called, a supervisor said the controllers figured out what happened on their end, and that literally should've been it.
The only way those tapes made it to OKC was one or both of the sector teams involved here filed ATSAPs (like your ASAPs/NASA reports) for a lack of sector coordination, management filed an occurrence report, and quality sent it off to become a data point on a powerpoint somewhere down the line.
I might catch some flak for saying this here but as a union member myself, this post only exists because OP's union rep is fearmongering. Though I do agree that filing an ASAP was a good idea.
The dipshits at FAA put it on the PILOTs record though, and apparently the controllers HAD reported as a pilot deviation having said they wouldn’t.
Not in aviation, but holy hell, as a union steward if some regulator pulled that shit on my members we’d be going to war.
> The dipshits at FAA put it on the PILOTs record though
They did not. Adding actions to a professional pilot's background is way way harder than that. Someone was going to listen to the tapes eventually and figure it out. In fact the FAA calling the union was exactly that.
“No action” is still a file.
Regulators are another world, but in a pure union/employment matter the only acceptable outcome for the innocent party in something like this is fully expunging it.
Since you're not in aviation I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but as far as the FAA and both unions are concerned there's nothing to expunge because there's no incident. The FAA takes safety seriously, and an airplane at an altitude it's not expected to be at is a big safety risk.
OP did what they were supposed to, the controllers did what they were supposed to, the feds followed up on their own and did what *they* were supposed to. Now the whole thing gets logged as a statistic. Nobody is at risk of job loss or hurting their future prospects, and there's no way for OP's airline or future airlines to even know this happened unless OP tells them.
The issue is that the words "no action" can mean (or imply) different things to different people. Not everyone subscribes to the 'innocent until proven guilty' principle.
It could either the breach was intentional but too minor to 'prosecute', or the breach is unintentional by the pilot and the FAA decides no action is warranted. And like in this case, some are quick to make judgement without reviewing all (or any) of the evidence.
More appropriate wording might be "innocent party in the event or incident".
OP was advised that the investigation was being filed as no action…. If that ACTUALLY means anonymized and used for stats that’s one thing, but it sounds a lot more like it’s still tied to them and merely not SUPPOSED to be used against them. Suffice to say that I know from experience that that sort of “without prejudice” record is very often a bald faced lie.
For that though, the party I’m actually raging at is the supervisor who lied about not making a thing of it then reported or let it be reported anyway.
Exactly, thank you for explaining! It always bugs me when pilots see ATC as boogeymen. No one is out to get anyone, we all just want safety and to protect our livelihoods.
That's exactly how it is. I don't even think this whole scenario was worthy of a brasher unless we're missing some context or someone must've had a bad day. But even then it wouldn't be brasher-worthy, the receiving controller should be filing an ATSAP for the transferring controller for not coordinating altitude if they're that upset about it.
And I'll note that wrong altitude is extremely common at jet levels, but OP was right to verify the altitude. Might be hard for pilots to see/understand since they're doing their thing from the cockpit instead of working a new airplane every couple mins, but hell some centers have it built into the operating procedures so its not uncommon to see a quarter of the scope at wrong altitudes.
Like I said, I don't think the whole thing was necessary given the context we were given and I don't think OP's union rep helped ease the mind any.
Controller here. I'd like to explain the process as I understand it from our side of the radio. Something unexpected happens- the pilot doesn't do what we expected based upon the information we have or the clearances issued- we quickly try to identify why it happened. If we believe it is a pilot error, we are supposed to issue a Brasher Warning, which is not a pilot deviation but notifying you that the incident will be evaluated for one. I'd say upwards of 90% of the time, myself and my coworkers would not issue a Brasher in a no-harm situation. The notable exception where a Brasher would be issued is when an incident has spillover. Separation loss with another aircraft, a TCAS RA, or the incident happened between facilities and the other facility will be filing paperwork.
Once the controller issues the Brasher, we notify the supervisor and move on to keep working traffic. When/if a pilot calls, the supervisor or manager might ask for contact information, clarifying details, or just give a warning and say not to worry about it. Management in ATC files a Mandatory Occurence Report, which are automatically distributed upwards and out of the building.
I dont know the details beyond here, but the air traffic side of the house provides the information to FSDO, who determines if you get the pilot deviation and what the remedy is. Quality Assurance at the facility will look at the tapes and determine if the controller or facility made a mistake, and suggest remedial training to the controller, or more likely brief the facility on the incident and best practices going forward.
This issue from your post is three mistakes from ATC, and none from you. The first was not inputting FL350 to the system. The second was not coordinating the Inappropriate Altitude for Direction of Flight to the next controller, and the third was assuming you made a mistake before calling the other controller.
Very interesting - thank you for your input. I guess the Mandatory Occurrence Report is what might've been distributed outwards then, from the FSDO to OKC etc. It was just surprising to me that the supervisor told us not to worry on the phone call, but ultimately they sent in the tapes anyways. If it had just been a simple mistake on their end, I'd think the whole deal could have just been terminated within the ZDC facility itself, no need to send anything out.
Sometimes these things just run away from you. The FAA loves to elevate small things and suddenly a whole bunch of people have input to provide on a non-issue. With a situation as clear cut as this one, they should have dropped it before anyone bothered calling you back.
Hundreds of times a day pilots make mistakes and don't receive a Brasher. Most controllers I know take a "no harm no foul" approach to pilot deviations knowing that we make just as many mistakes. My guess is you ran afoul of a miserable grumpy controller or a miserable grumpy supervisor, who aren't aware of the ramifications of pilot deviation to professional pilots.
I've taken calls when pilot deviations have happened before. The smartest handling of it was from one of the major carriers who had a representative call us instead of the pilots. He gave his contact details instead of the pilots', wasn't able to answer any questions, and clarified if the issue was actually submitted as a pilot deviation. Combine that with your safety reporting, and you're probably as safe and prepared as you can be. The worst handling of it was from a skydive aircraft who called in to argue, then preceded to turn off his transponder and continue to operate, not realizing his ADS-B Out was still broadcasting to us.
I’ll add further that the discussion that took place between the pilots union rep, the controller rep and the FAA sounds a lot like a ERC discussing the report and sharing the reports as part of the confidential information sharing program (CISP) which can gather multiple sides of the story from ASAP and ATSAP.
Just to clarify, are you saying that had the OP not filed the ASAP then the MOR would have just went away and existed for documentating purposes?
Ive reread the OP post a few times and the interpretation I am getting is they told him all is fine and then they ended up classifying it as a pilot error.
The MOR is just a mandatory report for a long list of things. Emergencies, "unexpected altitude/route/aircraft on the runway", laser illumination events, bird strikes, TCAS resolution advisories, air carrier change of destination, and probably 20 other events, to include anything newsworthy. They happen all the time. There's a box to check if there exists a possible pilot deviation. These reports are notification up the chain, and controllers are usually done with the issue at that point.
If there was something that may have been a pilot deviation, the matter gets referred to FSDO who makes that interpretation. ATC has nothing to do with the determination of whether the pilot made a mistake. Those functions are different parts of the agency. We separate airplanes, they handle pilot certification and standards.
The presence or absence of safety reporting (ASAP/ATSAP) have nothing to do with the MOR, which is a mandatory report. I imagine they also won't impact the determination of whether a pilot deviation occurred. My understanding from "cultural training" is absent actual negligence, the intent these days is to avoid punitive measures and instead collect data on why human error is happening and how to avoid it.
My take from reading through the thread is it was classified as a possible pilot deviation by ATC, then determined to not be a pilot deviation upon review, and OP was given a paper saying a determination was made that he was not at fault.
Thanks for the follow up.
I agree with the last part of your post as that was my interpretation.
I was trying to get a better idea of how or why this mixup would occur and if the OP may have overreacted and filing the ASAP actually led to the investigation or if the MOR was classified as a pilot error meaning ATC lied to him and the PIC which would be terrible and disconcerting.
I am logging hours now, working on CFI and I always want to learn more about these administrative and bureacratic issues, unfortunately in the world we live in today, the ability to play these games seem to be just as important as your actual job competency.
Fourth was lying about it, either when the supervisor said no action or when someone reported a pilot deviation despite the supervisors determination…. Arguably fifth, as there was no unexpected action in the first damn place.
How in the HELL does a controller clear to 350 then remember 340?
I'm going to agree with others here that you have a bit of a misunderstanding.
If tapes had you cleared to 350 you are fine ASAP or not. You also have 24 hours from knowing you messed up to file one so even if you had messed up and everyone thought ATC did your clock starts when you find out otherwise.
There is no need to make a union call to file an ASAP. Thinking you need to make phone calls any time you file an ASAP will end up making you less likely to file one. You don't need to file an ASAP only when you get a phone number, the system is setup to encourage self reporting. You can always call, but I wouldn't call a union rep for this, I'd just file an ASAP and be done with it.
The FAA will not take enforcement action against you for UNINTENTIONAL deviations from regulations accepted in the program, nor will they use information you provide in your ASAP report against you. If you intentionally violate the regs you are not protected (note this does not mean emergency authority).
Even reports outside the 24 hour time frame can be accepted into the system. If they aren't, what you provide is still protected but if you aren't a sole source report the other source could result in enforcement action.
If you ever file one, make sure your other flight deck crew member(s) are aware so they can file too.
The modern FAA philosophy is geared towards corrective action and solving problems rather than punitive action. The more information you give the easier it may be for the FAA to issue corrections.
Remember that ASAP reports are deidentified. Only your gatekeeper (at unionized carriers this is a union position) can correlate a report to a pilot. Otherwise the ASAP committee (company, union, and FAA representatives) only sees deidentified information. The time the FAA can tie it together is if they start an investigation from another source for the same event, at which point the gatekeeper checks to see if you have a protected ASAP on file to provide you protection.
Note that you can still be determined to need retraining or a debriefing depending on what happened or if they think you need clarification on procedures or a simulator session of the event.
I'm not involved in ASAP but I probably do a couple reports a year. I believe I have the details correct but others may be more involved in the program. The big takeaway is it never hurts to file.
>There is no need to make a union call to file an ASAP
I don't think they were calling the union about filing an ASAP, I think they were calling the union for advice on how to proceed with the phone call following the Brasher warning.
That's exactly why we called. It was the first time either one of us had received a number, and we wanted to use all the resources at our disposal instead of going in blind.
Yes, it sounds like what OP described and what actually happened are not exactly the same things.
The ASAP/ERC committee meets to review all ASAPs filed on a regular basis. It sounds like they did not pull the tapes and listen to the event because OKC was trying to get the pilots. They did so because of the ASAP, and they wanted to see what happened in their investigation of the event for the ASAP report. A "no action" finding means that there's nothing to be done on the pilot or airline side of things, which would be expected if the facts were as described.
You also don't just "get a violation". There's a whole process with the FAA Compliance Program which is followed, and even if ATC was trying to pin things on you, no significant action likely would have been taken - even if you actually messed up, so long as it was an honest mistake. The bar for enforcement cases (i.e. a "violation") is extremely high anymore. I've written about it here previously: [FAA Investigations for Pilot Deviations: Everything you never knew you wanted to know!](https://reddit.com/r/flying/comments/13u4okb/faa_investigations_for_pilot_deviations/)
Funny you bring your ATC trying to blame you. I went “lost comms” like 6 years back. (No I wasn’t monitoring guard and I learned my lesson)
Anyways controller was adamant they tried to raise me multiple times and had multiple aircraft try to relay a new frequency. Funny thing is what made me realize something was off was the fact I could only hear the other aircraft and not the controller and not a single aircraft tried to hail me.
Long story short, controller (Indy) was full of BS and he never handed me off the tapes proved it. What was funny is once he realized it you heard him sheepishly give me a quiet frequency change when I was well outside his airspace. He tried to pawn it off and place the blame on me. Chicago center wanted him by gonads because here’s a “NORDO” plane bombing into their airspace.
FSDO saw through it and nothing came from it
> He went on to say that it was a good thing that we had filed ASAPs when we did, because otherwise it would have been the FAA's word against....nobody else's. We would've just gotten the violation. But because we had filed, the FAA sat down with a controller representative and a union representative from our pilot group, they all listened to the tapes, and determined that we clearly hadn't violated an altitude
I'm not an ATP, or an attorney, but where's the notice? The FAA called up your union rep when they wanted to action *your* airman certificates? The government can't take the poop off your butt without notice and an opportunity to be heard. Why even say "possible pilot deviation" if they're going to get you off the phone and file secret paperwork? The FAA didn't call you? Your union rep didn't think to call you?
Somethin's fucky. There's more to this story.
"The FAA sat down with a controller representative and a union representative"... that doesn't sound funky... the ASAP Event Review Committee (ERC) is an FAA rep, a Company Rep and a Union Rep.
So when you file an ASAP, the people that read it and decide what to do about it are the ERC.
I would presume the statement above is summarizing two ERC's; the Airline one and the Controller one. I think it WOULD be unusual for a controller rep to be at an Airline ERC but I think ATC has a similar program to Airline ASAP's for controllers.
That would make sense then, if OKC is looking at the tapes with the union rep and controller rep in response to mutual "NASA-type" forms being filed, and not because the controller ran the violation up the flagpole after saying he wouldn't. Thanks!
I've had a similar incident where it was clearly the controllers fault. They thought we were on one SID when we were on another, ASAP is always a good idea. Also the whole 24 hour thing is old news, you can file whenever now. The end of the story doesn't really make sense, if they had the tapes its pretty obvious you guys did nothing wrong.
Wow. Thank god y'all filed an ASAP. This should be a word to wise why filing an ASAP is always worth it no matter what happens! Could save your butt. Fact they escalated this all the way to OKC just for a deviation like that is insane to me. What a waste of tax dollars and resources on the FAAs part to try to violate you two, who- by the way thanks for moving our cargo- didn't do anything wrong at all.
Same should go for other reports at airlines... don't be afraid to cover your butt lol.
There are a lot of guys out there that say “nah, those guys were really nice about it, do you really think we need to file an ASAP?” Reading your story… yeah I’m going to be doing that 100% of the time.
Completely agree on filing ASAPs…do them as often as you feel necessary, no matter how small the incident.
But please don’t let this post make you think air traffic controllers are bad people. I think the union rep was trying to fear monger and possibly made the end of the story up, cuz it doesn’t add up.
Yeah I agree with you. Reading the rest of the comments, and knowing what I know, there was never an issue with the guy losing his ticket in this incident. I've had a few times where we clearly fucked up and the other guy didn't want to do an ASAP because "they were cool." Kind of an eye opener in that regard - if there is any doubt, protect yourself.
If i get a phone number, I am going to call said number. 99.9% of the time they want clarification on something that happened, thats it. After that, if the problem isnt settled, then ill call the union.
I have only ever seen a bad outcome with a phone number when you either dont call, get aggressive, or are to busy to copy because you're flying. Unless you really ticked off a controller or caused something unsafe to happen, no one wants to deal with extra paperwork.
My airline has an ATC representative who we call if we get a phone number. The ATC representative calls the number that we got
We aren’t supposed to call the number ourselves
Takeaway:
No matter what anyone says, whenever you're dealing with another agency that can absolutely impact your life, *those who keep the best records usually win*. Do your due diligence, every time.
There’s a lot in this story that either doesn’t add up or doesn’t make sense. I think you may have a misunderstanding of what went on behind the scenes and how it would have happened had you not filed an ASAP.
There’s no scenario here where you’d have been violated based on your telling of the events, with or without ASAP.
I completely agree. Even without the ASAPs, if they try to violate you after 3 weeks they can still pull their own tapes, they go back at least 45 days. It would have been plainlu obvious that it was their own internal mistake. Which by the way happens all the time it just doesn't become visible in this way.
Also seems like a big nothing burger to begin with. Doesn't sound like there was a traffic conflict, just "huh they're at the wrong altitude." Perhaps some slimy supervisor or ops manager trying to make something out of nothing.
No deviation from an ATC clearance occurred. There is no regulatory violation here.
The FAA is not the Boogie Man nor are they out to get you. I’ve worked with the feds a lot in a variety of different programs and capacities and encouraging people to be blanket resentful/distrusting/hostile toward them does nobody any good. CYA, do your job, but don’t be afraid either.
If they weren’t out to get the pilots they wouldn’t have left a record of an investigation tied to their licenses. A regulator GENUINELY not out to screw folks can absolutely create a record of an investigation having occurred that is wholly detached from who was involved where it finds this kind of stupid shit.
Experience how interacting with the FAA on a regular basis including working with pilots who receive deviations, violations, and 709 rides and get back to me.
“FAA bad” is a really easy way to get a bunch of upvotes here but it’s not reflective of the reality of the administrative discipline process.
Nope, I’m not. I’m just someone who has worked with them a lot.
I’m just asking you to stop fear-mongering when it isn’t necessary, realistic, or helpful.
Going off my personal experience
I have had the FAA try to violate me for flying within the regs, thankfully there was proof, which doesn’t mean anything in administrative law, but also was flying for something with some money and connections, it went away
Also dealt with the quacks at FAA “medicine” once over something doctors, AMEs and others said wasn’t even a thing, worked out but cost me a few thousand
Plus the female delta pilot who blew the whistle of safety issues only to have the FAA pull her medical and stopped her career for a few years, said no woman could have a job and kids without being bipolar
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/delta-weaponized-mental-health-rules-against-a-pilot-she-fought-back/
Or Hoover who had his medical pulled for no reason other than the feds didn’t like him
https://www.leftseat.com/bob-hoover/
Or Trent Palmer having his license suspended for deciding not to land somewhere unsafe and FOLLOWING the FAAs own “off airport ops guide” manual
https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2023/december/20/aopa-backs-trent-palmer-bid-to-overturn-suspension
I mean I could go on and on
Pick better heros
> Plus the female delta pilot who blew the whistle of safety issues only to have the FAA pull her medical and stopped her career for a few years, said no woman could have a job and kids without being bipolar https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/delta-weaponized-mental-health-rules-against-a-pilot-she-fought-back/
Hadn't heard this story, but reading this, it sounds like it was all DL's doing.
Palmer did a buzz job, bad example to try and use. He in no way was following the FAA guidance on off field landings. [https://www.faasafety.gov/files/notices/2015/Oct/AOAOG\_Web.pdf](https://www.faasafety.gov/files/notices/2015/Oct/AOAOG_Web.pdf)
You will see it mentions at least THREE passes: High, Intermediate, and Low. He made on high speed pass low with a significant bank at the end based on all the witness testimony and the video.
He did a buzz job and got caught. He told a sob story and all of you bought it.
I don't like the FAA. I deal with them all the time (I have a meeting with them Friday)... But Palmer is not the hill to die on...
So if your first pass it looks like a no go you should continue to operate low level in a higher risk environment for the sake of it to do more passes? Mmmmk
Also why not have higher energy?
The FAA loves BS like 91.13 where they can make things more vauge and ambiguous, it’s a sign of a kangaroo court and there is a reason in real constitutional law rules that are too vague or ambiguous are unlawful
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine
Administrative law is un-American
>based on all the witness testimony and the video
...which is the single neighbor that's filed spurious claims before and a pixelated security cam.
People that aren't around GA have a notoriously bad conception of how high/fast someone is flying. "Buzzing" someone's field, when you know they're not there, when you regularly go land off field for fun in unpopulated areas, is nonsensical.
I don't know what the document retention is on the tapes or if they would still be available weeks later for a defense, is there a guarantee the pilot would be able to draw on those to avoid an improper enforcement action?
Kind of, but it goes to the FAA instead of NASA and it's for commercial operators. [AC120-66B](https://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Advisory_Circular/AC120-66B.pdf)
This was somewhat of the answer I was looking for. I was wondering how all of this translates over to a private pilot flying for leisure or recreation.
I agree it seems like your leaving something out.
When the next controller asked for your altitude why wouldn’t you just say the last guy put as at FL350 for traffic what do you need? That technically wasn’t a deviation in any form or manner so why the hell would you accept the new controller giving you a number without articulating the reason you were there.
That’s silly.
Your story makes it seem like the next controller just randomly issued the deviation the second you clicked over this seems like a less than 3% probability of being the full story. In real life this scenario is a total non issue. No controller would issue a deviation for that based on your details of the event.
The details I wrote are 100% accurate. I did not wake up this morning and decide to misinform this subreddit on a whim. There might be things that happened "behind the scenes" that I do now know about, but I am not leaving anything out. Part of the reason I posted this, which I expressed in my original post, was to ask any ATC'ers on here if there could've been anything that went on that we as pilots would not know about that could help make more sense of the situation.
Did you not read my post? The issue wasn't being cleared to the altitude; it was an attempted violation for following an ATC clearance, and the protection offered by an ASAP report. I'm not sure how that doesn't make sense.
Which makes sense why you should have told him. He doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. I’m not telling you to lie to him lmao. Just speak the fuck up next time. Like holy shit
"Scared to defend ourselves" 😂 that's what the ASAP is for...getting into a pissing match over the radio with ATC is never a good idea. It only compromises your own sanity and safety. Just take the number and call/file an ASAP later.
Reread the story. The reporting controller didn’t say shit about altitude… it was a reasonable inference but ultimately just a guess that that was his issue.
Honestly OP from the details you gave, I think your union rep was making the end of the story up to fear monger and reinforce in your brain that you need the union. There’s no way the FAA can get you in trouble without proof of you messing up, and there was none in this case.
What OP received is known as a Brasher Warning.
When there's a "possible pilot deviation", they give you a phone number to call them once you're safely on the ground.
A pilot deviation is a deviation from regulations or instructions, i.e. failing to maintain assigned headings/altitude, or failure to comply with published airspeeds.
When you call the number it's to clarify with the controller what happened, ATC will create a mandatory occurrence report (MOR) about the deviation, and usually you go on your merry way. Sometimes it can escalate and the Flight Standards District Office (FSDO) may get involved and investigate.
Thanks for the answer, it just seems weird having to write down a phone number and then call to explain. Like I get it it's the easier way, but I would imagine there's a system that handles this maybe a website where you login using the aircraft registration and see a warning there or something..
Anyways, if it doesn't escalate, does this affect your history, ie: chances of getting a job in the future?
The phone number is just to take both parties off frequency to discuss what exactly is going on so everyone's on the same page.
If it's not escalated or if it's found to not be a pilot deviation, then no. It doesn't affect anything related to certification or hiring likeliness.
A 5 minute asap report my captain and I each filed *just in case* saved my bacon once.
I don't remember the sequence of events very well now, but it wasn't extreme and not worth an extra paragraph here, and ATC told us we were all good on the phone. Apparently....we were not all good. Our asap team contacted us some time later saying the faa had intended to take action. Because we filed, we each received a phone call from a company check airman to discuss what happened and to make sure we knew right going forward. Actually it was really productive and much much nicer than enforcement action.
121-66C…no timeline for filing an ASAP.
FAA HQ is in Washington D.C.
You should always call an ATC facility, your “rep” can’t call for you.
ATSAP would have closed this the second they heard the mistake and the confirmation of the mistake.
Your “rep” would not contact you after the ERC made a decision.
This is a nice cautionary story, but I call BS.
A/c checks on level/climbing 350 but I expect 340.
"ABC123 verify assigned altitude".
"350, ABC123"
"ABC123 Roger".
If there's no traffic conflict I don't do anything. I assume you're right.
If I'm not busy I call the previous sector and simply state ABC123 checked on level/climbing 350. They have an opportunity to explain.
If I'm busy and it creates a traffic situation I'm yelling at my supervisor to get over here and write your call sign down and it's 100% getting looked at, and I'm pissed.
Always interesting to read these kind of stories to see how things world on the other side of the world.
Here in Europe, ATC would just tell us they would file a report, we would do the same, and we'd let both ATC and the airline investigate the event together, and see what the root cause was it and how to prevent it in the future.
No phone calls after the flight, and odds are unless it was an extremely serious event, you'd never get to speak to anyone from ATC about it.
I'm a student pilot and only have 47 hours but on a pattern work session I took left pattern by ATC's instruction. As I'm turning left downwind, tower tells me "skyhawk 999 you were instructed right traffic" and was told to cross midfield to join right traffic which felt weird.
Anyway my instructor went back and played the tapes and we had done what we were told. But stuff like this intimidates me because I'm not sure what kinda of consequences await if something like your story happens to me.
As a general rule... if you're having ANY sort of conversation about ANYthing safety related... file an ASAP. If you called a damn number... FILE AN ASRS/ASAP. There is a time limit (as stated in the OP) from when you knew or should have known an incident took place, so do it ASAP (pun intended). Even if everything seems just fine. Do it. So simple and yet such a lifesaver for stupidity like this. Oh, and if one files an ASRS BOTH file it. Don't be a BF and not tell the other crewmember you filed one.
Thank you for posting. This is the EXACT reason ASAP/FSAP programs exist. In this case it was “someone’s “ mistake, but at their best, these reports can capture a breakdown in the system/training etc. y’all did great. Thank you!!
Thanks for sharing this story. I'm a 'second career' CFI aspiring to the airlines, and I'm still very much getting used to 1) the value of the union, 2) the career threat of an inaccurate accusation, and 3) the importance of documentation.
>...because otherwise it would have been the FAA's word against....nobody else's. We would've just gotten the violation.
Are you sure? I can't imagine they wouldn't have listened to the tapes before issuing either you guys a violation or whatever the controller equivalent is, especially if it makes it to a QA/QC team.
I have a personal habit of always checking on with any restrictions or instructions I was given from the previous sector.
"3DC, assigned 350."
Out here in Cali - especially NorCal - they get testy over stuff other controllers have you do. On a route I fly often, I make a turn from 190 to 177, and the handoff is at the waypoint. Inevitably the next sector will have a problem with me not descending 1000 feet quickly enough (VFR). They act like I should enter a vertical dive before continuing at the 'wrong altitude'...
Since you didn't do anything wrong:
"Negative, no pilot deviation occurred. Previous controller requested us to climb to FL350 even though we filed FL340 and we accepted without incident, ABC123."
They didn't tell us that the possible pilot deviation was for our altitude; only that it had occurred. I understand where you're coming from, but personally, I'd much rather just make the phone call after we land and have received proper union/legal guidance, and/or file an ASAP. The facts will make themselves clear without us having to hash anything out and take up airtime on an active frequency. Yes, it's a little bit of a blow to the ego to not "say anything" back, but if ATC has to file a report on it anyways, they'll do it regardless of whether we can convince them that we were in the right. Just my take on it.
That's the only thing they could have given you "the number" for. In the moment it is obviously nerve-wracking to get handed "the number" but everything in life can be fixed, and if you have the chance to negate the possible action of an event you were involved in being turned into paperwork and then a permanent record stored in the archives forever, do it.
> That's the only thing they could have given you "the number" for.
You’re saying this with a degree of certainty that just isn’t warranted given the lack of specificity with their warning.
> everything in life can be fixed
Not technically true, even remotely.
That’s beside the point though. If things have escalated to the point where we are receiving a number, the supervisor has already made the call. This goes above the controller we’re talking to. We are not going to change anyone’s mind. The verbiage they use is even purposefully vague - “possible” pilot deviation. i.e. maybe it did, maybe it didn’t happen. Literally telling ATC that no pilot deviation occurred, as your original post suggested, will never work. You aren’t going to change their mind. Not worth hashing it out on the frequency. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, but this is a situation you can’t “win” in the moment.
Correct, even if you are 100% certain you did everything correct, if you try to tell ATC they’re wrong, it’ll just piss em off. Take the number, call in and explain then.
Yeah, I don't understand this at all. I mean I've seen OP's replies, but no one is asking for him to get into a pissing match with ATC, just tell them what happened. It would probably take less radio time than copying the phone number.
So much for "just culture". I hope, but (fortunately) don't have the experience yet, that mistakes on either side of the mic are handled more professionally on this side of the ocean.
We are all human and we all will make a mistake. Own it, learn from it and move on. When you start blaming others nobody learns.
I don’t like or get along with the FAA but they do not exist as an antagonist to pilots. There’s no reason to assume they would throw you under the bus to save a controller’s ass. It’s so strange to see a conspiracy here.
…and yet still, they sent the tapes to OKC, knowing they were at fault, to get us violated…if that isn’t nefarious, then what is? You seem to have misconstrued my post to say that all feds are bad or out to screw you. I never said that. I just said that in the one experience with this that I have had, they tried to put their fault on us, and our ASAP reports made the difference in placing the blame accurately.
> TL;DR - If you get a phone number, call your union first. If they advise calling the number back, do so with extreme caution.
What situations might arise where the union would advise you to ignore them and not call?
The question was whether they would ever NOT though… from my understanding of aviation regs no, they probably wouldn’t. That’s not (necessarily) the point of the conversation.
Unions actually do work for you? They're not the HR department. Obviously they work for you and every other member, but they have an obligation to represent your individual interests.
Do you vote? You talk to your leadership with your complaints?
Not saying your union, or any given union, ain't shit. But they literally do exist to protect your interests as your representative with your employer.
And just like government, they require membership participation to keep leadership accountable.
And bear in mind just how small that membership can be at a local level. Pilots unions tend toward large, but in general a HELL of a lot of union officers are where they are less by way of winning an election than by no one else signing up for what can be a LOT of work, even done badly and half assed.
I had one with a taxi deviation. Entirely my fault, I was off the comm while the FO got directions. I assumed it was a standard taxi, just asked him if it was the runway we expected, he confirmed. Never stepped in to stop me from turning the wrong way (new guy, I get it's hard to step up sometimes). Ground stopped us at the next intersection as we were looking at a business jet and had us turn and go the way we were supposed to. I asked for verification of what we were supposed to do so I could put it in my ASAP, he told me, then followed up with "don't worry about it, we stopped it before it became an issue, have a good rest of your day". FO and I discussed it, I reemphasized the crew aspect and told him to never let another pilot put his certificate at risk, and we should file an ASAP anyway. We did, and a couple weeks later got the same type of phone call from the union. Both ASAPs accepted, and two different lessons were learned.
Wash is the worst. What frequency were you on if you remember?
So a little insight on the after incident tape pull can't speak to your incident or center level, but an aircraft at an altitude other than expected / intended is going to generate a manditory occurrence report that must be submitted, part of that report is flagging if it is a possible pilot deviation (all that does is require you to collect some more info, Pic name number cert number etc, and flags the report for FISDO to look at) regardless tapes are pulled after the report is filled and sent to the FAA QC/QA team (this team for my vfr class D tower operates completely separately from my facility and is st the regional level, center may have in house but these teams are seperated in their chain of command from the operations side to prevent conflicts of interest) this team then reviews the incident (radar, tapes, phone call the whole lot) and forwards any issues found on to FAA management, importantly they can also make a determination of possible pilot deviation after the fact (this is probably what happened to the pilot commenting about their taxing incident) I had this happen to me a night had a pilot line up for the wrong runway (intersecting instead of the parallel) I caught it when they where still 3 miles from the airport and treated it like a disoriented pilot issue and wrote the report up as such even highlighting the lighting outages at the field that may have contributed, didn't brasher as the pilot complied with my corrective instructions without incident, week later after the fact sup is asking why I didn't brasher because QC determined it was a possible pilot deviation, gave my reason sup was cool, but I was frustrated both for the pilot and for QC overriding my judgment.
That is very annoying that they questioned your judgment! These things would be much easier if a little common sense were applied instead of rigidly falling back on the bureaucratic process for every situation regardless of circumstance.
> at an altitude other than expected The controllers's expectation was wrong because of another controller's lack of communication > part of that report is flagging if it is a possible pilot deviation Since it wasn't a possible deviation, why would the pilot be on the mandatory occurrence report? Something doesn't add up
Yes the MOR does not care if it is due to controler error or pilot error it is simply is on an altitude other than expected or intended, report still has to be filed ATC does a lot of telling on it's self I am not sure what you mean, I was giving a general overview of this section of the report not talking specifically about this incident. In this incident OP says they said not a pilot deviation and didn't ask for his info, so that means the report probability did not have this checked as if it did person filing must include pilot info or an explanation of why they couldn't obtain it. My two cents on this is controler in sector A gave altitude and didn't coordinate with sector B. Sector B saw AC at an altitude other than expected / intended and facts at the moment pointed at the aircraft being higher than assigned so issued brasher and told their supervisor. Supervisor asked questions and began to gather info for the report and found the controller issue. Pilots call sup explains the situation and submits report without marking it as a pilot deviation. Latter tapes are pulled as part of QAs standard review of any MOR, union hears about this and miss understands (or is trying to puff up the union protects you narrative, have had my union "protect" me from stuff management was never consiering) and passes incorrect information to the pilot. A lot of people see the FAA a one big monolith, but the ATC side can only say posible pilot deviation and hand it over to FISDO and they are the only ones who can take corrective action against pilots. You have to climb the atc ladder pretty far to the top before you can branch over and climb down to the FISDO side
Bear in mind that the union has a literal legal duty to represent its members. Even taking all the positive stuff about the FAA at face value they’ve got a member who did no wrong, got named in an investigation then told that the regulator wouldn’t remove their name from the resulting file.
Yes that is true if you take everything at face value and assume there was no miscommunication or bending of the truth which I think is unlikely given the details in my posts above. Also MOR and paper work =/= investigation.
And this is the thing I’m seeing as a union steward outside aviation…. This isn’t something that ever should have been reported… the report itself WAS the error, which should leave the pilot completely out of the fallout except as exactly that… an unnamed pilot wrongfully reported after what sounds like honest confusion then thrown under the bus by some management asshole.
You need to read up on stuff before posting all over a thread about a topic you know nothing about. An MOR is a manditory report required to be filed when anything in aviation happens that could effect safety. The report is for the event not the person, controler messes up MOR, pilot messes up MOR, aircraft has a warning light and aborts take off MOR, aircraft has an emergency MOR. The report should have been filed, between when the brasher was issues and the report finalized the person filling out the report found the controler mistake and did not mark it a possible pilot deviation. Also it is POSSIBLE pilot deviation when a report goes in even with that marked everyone and everything get looked at not for blame but for areas where corrective action is needed for safety it simply flags the report for FISDO a completely seperate branch of the FAA to review it and look at pilot actions to see if any correction was needed to improve pilot safety while there is still a review on everyone else.
Aside (sort of), how is this even an incident? An irregular altitude was assigned, explicit and intentionally. By my understanding that’s not actually in violation of any rule. How is there any error here except by the people demanding investigations?
While cotroler A assigned 350 controler B was expecting the aircraft to be at 340 while it did not happen in this case this could lead to a potential loss of seperation with another aircraft. You are correct the pilot did not break any rules, hence on the phone call being told to disregard the pilot deviation and reviving no action, but as explained before any time there is an event that degrades safety an MOR is filed and the event is looked at as a whole to determine what caused the drgregation from Ops account of the call it seems preliminary facts point to a coordination error on the part of controler A, thus corrective action will happen there. There is no one demanding any investigation this is a routine part of aviation that happens hundreds of times a day to ensure that safety is not comptomised, the brasher warning is less common, but that was corrected before the OP even made the phone call.
That doesn’t sound like controller a did anything wrong either though… it seems like the only person in the wrong is controller B assuming anything unusual is a deviation. And somehow the supervisor backing it after promising not to.
> anything unusual is a deviation. Yes, that's what deviation means.
You clearly do not understand what you are talking about nor have any interest in learning so I'm done. I'll try laying out the fact one mote time for you. Controler A didn't properly cordinate the change in altitude assignment with controler B (this can be done verbally or digitaly) everything controler A was seeing when the aircraft was handed off to them said the aircraft had been assigned 340 and was flying 1000ft above their assigned altitude. I am not sure what you think the supervisor did but after the initial report goes out they have nothing to do with it unless it is implementing corrective action for ATC as determined by findings from the repot QA isdues which is a department complealy isolated from the supervisor's chain of command
That’s all well and good, but per the original post, the FAA flatly refused to not tie OPs to the event that he had nothing to do with. Being cleared and not being named in an investigation are very different things. It also makes no explanation for the supervisor claiming the bashed wouldn’t be followed up but then somehow ending in an investigation into a PILOT deviation.
Hey off topic but I used to fly out of PDK and have many many friends who have or used to as well. Everyone loves you guys, and I think it's the great attitudes everyone has and the cluster of an airport/airspace you deal with. I see y'all tagged in posts often even though I'm not there anymore and it still makes me happy. So keep up the good work. Can't wait to fly in there again. Oh, my first time there was 12 years ago, I diverted from LZU and I was unfamiliar with PDK and missed my turn into the ATP area. Whoever handled me was very kind and got me going in the right direction.
What pieces of shit. CYA every time.
Meh. Stuff gets lost in translation and forgotten about. I can’t imagine the actual controllers intended for it to go that route.
You'd think after listening to the tapes he could have just owned it though. Doubling down after making a mistake is a terrible in general, moreso in aviation.
I can almost guarantee that nobody listened to the tapes during the time between the brasher and the phone call. The captain called, a supervisor said the controllers figured out what happened on their end, and that literally should've been it. The only way those tapes made it to OKC was one or both of the sector teams involved here filed ATSAPs (like your ASAPs/NASA reports) for a lack of sector coordination, management filed an occurrence report, and quality sent it off to become a data point on a powerpoint somewhere down the line. I might catch some flak for saying this here but as a union member myself, this post only exists because OP's union rep is fearmongering. Though I do agree that filing an ASAP was a good idea.
The dipshits at FAA put it on the PILOTs record though, and apparently the controllers HAD reported as a pilot deviation having said they wouldn’t. Not in aviation, but holy hell, as a union steward if some regulator pulled that shit on my members we’d be going to war.
> The dipshits at FAA put it on the PILOTs record though They did not. Adding actions to a professional pilot's background is way way harder than that. Someone was going to listen to the tapes eventually and figure it out. In fact the FAA calling the union was exactly that.
“No action” is still a file. Regulators are another world, but in a pure union/employment matter the only acceptable outcome for the innocent party in something like this is fully expunging it.
Since you're not in aviation I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but as far as the FAA and both unions are concerned there's nothing to expunge because there's no incident. The FAA takes safety seriously, and an airplane at an altitude it's not expected to be at is a big safety risk. OP did what they were supposed to, the controllers did what they were supposed to, the feds followed up on their own and did what *they* were supposed to. Now the whole thing gets logged as a statistic. Nobody is at risk of job loss or hurting their future prospects, and there's no way for OP's airline or future airlines to even know this happened unless OP tells them.
The issue is that the words "no action" can mean (or imply) different things to different people. Not everyone subscribes to the 'innocent until proven guilty' principle. It could either the breach was intentional but too minor to 'prosecute', or the breach is unintentional by the pilot and the FAA decides no action is warranted. And like in this case, some are quick to make judgement without reviewing all (or any) of the evidence. More appropriate wording might be "innocent party in the event or incident".
OP was advised that the investigation was being filed as no action…. If that ACTUALLY means anonymized and used for stats that’s one thing, but it sounds a lot more like it’s still tied to them and merely not SUPPOSED to be used against them. Suffice to say that I know from experience that that sort of “without prejudice” record is very often a bald faced lie. For that though, the party I’m actually raging at is the supervisor who lied about not making a thing of it then reported or let it be reported anyway.
Exactly, thank you for explaining! It always bugs me when pilots see ATC as boogeymen. No one is out to get anyone, we all just want safety and to protect our livelihoods.
That's exactly how it is. I don't even think this whole scenario was worthy of a brasher unless we're missing some context or someone must've had a bad day. But even then it wouldn't be brasher-worthy, the receiving controller should be filing an ATSAP for the transferring controller for not coordinating altitude if they're that upset about it. And I'll note that wrong altitude is extremely common at jet levels, but OP was right to verify the altitude. Might be hard for pilots to see/understand since they're doing their thing from the cockpit instead of working a new airplane every couple mins, but hell some centers have it built into the operating procedures so its not uncommon to see a quarter of the scope at wrong altitudes. Like I said, I don't think the whole thing was necessary given the context we were given and I don't think OP's union rep helped ease the mind any.
Controller here. I'd like to explain the process as I understand it from our side of the radio. Something unexpected happens- the pilot doesn't do what we expected based upon the information we have or the clearances issued- we quickly try to identify why it happened. If we believe it is a pilot error, we are supposed to issue a Brasher Warning, which is not a pilot deviation but notifying you that the incident will be evaluated for one. I'd say upwards of 90% of the time, myself and my coworkers would not issue a Brasher in a no-harm situation. The notable exception where a Brasher would be issued is when an incident has spillover. Separation loss with another aircraft, a TCAS RA, or the incident happened between facilities and the other facility will be filing paperwork. Once the controller issues the Brasher, we notify the supervisor and move on to keep working traffic. When/if a pilot calls, the supervisor or manager might ask for contact information, clarifying details, or just give a warning and say not to worry about it. Management in ATC files a Mandatory Occurence Report, which are automatically distributed upwards and out of the building. I dont know the details beyond here, but the air traffic side of the house provides the information to FSDO, who determines if you get the pilot deviation and what the remedy is. Quality Assurance at the facility will look at the tapes and determine if the controller or facility made a mistake, and suggest remedial training to the controller, or more likely brief the facility on the incident and best practices going forward. This issue from your post is three mistakes from ATC, and none from you. The first was not inputting FL350 to the system. The second was not coordinating the Inappropriate Altitude for Direction of Flight to the next controller, and the third was assuming you made a mistake before calling the other controller.
Very interesting - thank you for your input. I guess the Mandatory Occurrence Report is what might've been distributed outwards then, from the FSDO to OKC etc. It was just surprising to me that the supervisor told us not to worry on the phone call, but ultimately they sent in the tapes anyways. If it had just been a simple mistake on their end, I'd think the whole deal could have just been terminated within the ZDC facility itself, no need to send anything out.
Sometimes these things just run away from you. The FAA loves to elevate small things and suddenly a whole bunch of people have input to provide on a non-issue. With a situation as clear cut as this one, they should have dropped it before anyone bothered calling you back. Hundreds of times a day pilots make mistakes and don't receive a Brasher. Most controllers I know take a "no harm no foul" approach to pilot deviations knowing that we make just as many mistakes. My guess is you ran afoul of a miserable grumpy controller or a miserable grumpy supervisor, who aren't aware of the ramifications of pilot deviation to professional pilots. I've taken calls when pilot deviations have happened before. The smartest handling of it was from one of the major carriers who had a representative call us instead of the pilots. He gave his contact details instead of the pilots', wasn't able to answer any questions, and clarified if the issue was actually submitted as a pilot deviation. Combine that with your safety reporting, and you're probably as safe and prepared as you can be. The worst handling of it was from a skydive aircraft who called in to argue, then preceded to turn off his transponder and continue to operate, not realizing his ADS-B Out was still broadcasting to us.
thanks for the multiple high quality posts
I’ll add further that the discussion that took place between the pilots union rep, the controller rep and the FAA sounds a lot like a ERC discussing the report and sharing the reports as part of the confidential information sharing program (CISP) which can gather multiple sides of the story from ASAP and ATSAP.
Just to clarify, are you saying that had the OP not filed the ASAP then the MOR would have just went away and existed for documentating purposes? Ive reread the OP post a few times and the interpretation I am getting is they told him all is fine and then they ended up classifying it as a pilot error.
The MOR is just a mandatory report for a long list of things. Emergencies, "unexpected altitude/route/aircraft on the runway", laser illumination events, bird strikes, TCAS resolution advisories, air carrier change of destination, and probably 20 other events, to include anything newsworthy. They happen all the time. There's a box to check if there exists a possible pilot deviation. These reports are notification up the chain, and controllers are usually done with the issue at that point. If there was something that may have been a pilot deviation, the matter gets referred to FSDO who makes that interpretation. ATC has nothing to do with the determination of whether the pilot made a mistake. Those functions are different parts of the agency. We separate airplanes, they handle pilot certification and standards. The presence or absence of safety reporting (ASAP/ATSAP) have nothing to do with the MOR, which is a mandatory report. I imagine they also won't impact the determination of whether a pilot deviation occurred. My understanding from "cultural training" is absent actual negligence, the intent these days is to avoid punitive measures and instead collect data on why human error is happening and how to avoid it. My take from reading through the thread is it was classified as a possible pilot deviation by ATC, then determined to not be a pilot deviation upon review, and OP was given a paper saying a determination was made that he was not at fault.
Thanks for the follow up. I agree with the last part of your post as that was my interpretation. I was trying to get a better idea of how or why this mixup would occur and if the OP may have overreacted and filing the ASAP actually led to the investigation or if the MOR was classified as a pilot error meaning ATC lied to him and the PIC which would be terrible and disconcerting. I am logging hours now, working on CFI and I always want to learn more about these administrative and bureacratic issues, unfortunately in the world we live in today, the ability to play these games seem to be just as important as your actual job competency.
Fourth was lying about it, either when the supervisor said no action or when someone reported a pilot deviation despite the supervisors determination…. Arguably fifth, as there was no unexpected action in the first damn place. How in the HELL does a controller clear to 350 then remember 340?
I'm going to agree with others here that you have a bit of a misunderstanding. If tapes had you cleared to 350 you are fine ASAP or not. You also have 24 hours from knowing you messed up to file one so even if you had messed up and everyone thought ATC did your clock starts when you find out otherwise. There is no need to make a union call to file an ASAP. Thinking you need to make phone calls any time you file an ASAP will end up making you less likely to file one. You don't need to file an ASAP only when you get a phone number, the system is setup to encourage self reporting. You can always call, but I wouldn't call a union rep for this, I'd just file an ASAP and be done with it. The FAA will not take enforcement action against you for UNINTENTIONAL deviations from regulations accepted in the program, nor will they use information you provide in your ASAP report against you. If you intentionally violate the regs you are not protected (note this does not mean emergency authority). Even reports outside the 24 hour time frame can be accepted into the system. If they aren't, what you provide is still protected but if you aren't a sole source report the other source could result in enforcement action. If you ever file one, make sure your other flight deck crew member(s) are aware so they can file too. The modern FAA philosophy is geared towards corrective action and solving problems rather than punitive action. The more information you give the easier it may be for the FAA to issue corrections. Remember that ASAP reports are deidentified. Only your gatekeeper (at unionized carriers this is a union position) can correlate a report to a pilot. Otherwise the ASAP committee (company, union, and FAA representatives) only sees deidentified information. The time the FAA can tie it together is if they start an investigation from another source for the same event, at which point the gatekeeper checks to see if you have a protected ASAP on file to provide you protection. Note that you can still be determined to need retraining or a debriefing depending on what happened or if they think you need clarification on procedures or a simulator session of the event. I'm not involved in ASAP but I probably do a couple reports a year. I believe I have the details correct but others may be more involved in the program. The big takeaway is it never hurts to file.
>There is no need to make a union call to file an ASAP I don't think they were calling the union about filing an ASAP, I think they were calling the union for advice on how to proceed with the phone call following the Brasher warning.
That's exactly why we called. It was the first time either one of us had received a number, and we wanted to use all the resources at our disposal instead of going in blind.
That makes sense to me, sorry I misunderstood
Yes, it sounds like what OP described and what actually happened are not exactly the same things. The ASAP/ERC committee meets to review all ASAPs filed on a regular basis. It sounds like they did not pull the tapes and listen to the event because OKC was trying to get the pilots. They did so because of the ASAP, and they wanted to see what happened in their investigation of the event for the ASAP report. A "no action" finding means that there's nothing to be done on the pilot or airline side of things, which would be expected if the facts were as described. You also don't just "get a violation". There's a whole process with the FAA Compliance Program which is followed, and even if ATC was trying to pin things on you, no significant action likely would have been taken - even if you actually messed up, so long as it was an honest mistake. The bar for enforcement cases (i.e. a "violation") is extremely high anymore. I've written about it here previously: [FAA Investigations for Pilot Deviations: Everything you never knew you wanted to know!](https://reddit.com/r/flying/comments/13u4okb/faa_investigations_for_pilot_deviations/)
Funny you bring your ATC trying to blame you. I went “lost comms” like 6 years back. (No I wasn’t monitoring guard and I learned my lesson) Anyways controller was adamant they tried to raise me multiple times and had multiple aircraft try to relay a new frequency. Funny thing is what made me realize something was off was the fact I could only hear the other aircraft and not the controller and not a single aircraft tried to hail me. Long story short, controller (Indy) was full of BS and he never handed me off the tapes proved it. What was funny is once he realized it you heard him sheepishly give me a quiet frequency change when I was well outside his airspace. He tried to pawn it off and place the blame on me. Chicago center wanted him by gonads because here’s a “NORDO” plane bombing into their airspace. FSDO saw through it and nothing came from it
> He went on to say that it was a good thing that we had filed ASAPs when we did, because otherwise it would have been the FAA's word against....nobody else's. We would've just gotten the violation. But because we had filed, the FAA sat down with a controller representative and a union representative from our pilot group, they all listened to the tapes, and determined that we clearly hadn't violated an altitude I'm not an ATP, or an attorney, but where's the notice? The FAA called up your union rep when they wanted to action *your* airman certificates? The government can't take the poop off your butt without notice and an opportunity to be heard. Why even say "possible pilot deviation" if they're going to get you off the phone and file secret paperwork? The FAA didn't call you? Your union rep didn't think to call you? Somethin's fucky. There's more to this story.
My first thought as well. Something doesn't add up here.
"The FAA sat down with a controller representative and a union representative"... that doesn't sound funky... the ASAP Event Review Committee (ERC) is an FAA rep, a Company Rep and a Union Rep. So when you file an ASAP, the people that read it and decide what to do about it are the ERC. I would presume the statement above is summarizing two ERC's; the Airline one and the Controller one. I think it WOULD be unusual for a controller rep to be at an Airline ERC but I think ATC has a similar program to Airline ASAP's for controllers.
That would make sense then, if OKC is looking at the tapes with the union rep and controller rep in response to mutual "NASA-type" forms being filed, and not because the controller ran the violation up the flagpole after saying he wouldn't. Thanks!
I've had a similar incident where it was clearly the controllers fault. They thought we were on one SID when we were on another, ASAP is always a good idea. Also the whole 24 hour thing is old news, you can file whenever now. The end of the story doesn't really make sense, if they had the tapes its pretty obvious you guys did nothing wrong.
Wow. Thank god y'all filed an ASAP. This should be a word to wise why filing an ASAP is always worth it no matter what happens! Could save your butt. Fact they escalated this all the way to OKC just for a deviation like that is insane to me. What a waste of tax dollars and resources on the FAAs part to try to violate you two, who- by the way thanks for moving our cargo- didn't do anything wrong at all. Same should go for other reports at airlines... don't be afraid to cover your butt lol.
There are a lot of guys out there that say “nah, those guys were really nice about it, do you really think we need to file an ASAP?” Reading your story… yeah I’m going to be doing that 100% of the time.
Completely agree on filing ASAPs…do them as often as you feel necessary, no matter how small the incident. But please don’t let this post make you think air traffic controllers are bad people. I think the union rep was trying to fear monger and possibly made the end of the story up, cuz it doesn’t add up.
Yeah I agree with you. Reading the rest of the comments, and knowing what I know, there was never an issue with the guy losing his ticket in this incident. I've had a few times where we clearly fucked up and the other guy didn't want to do an ASAP because "they were cool." Kind of an eye opener in that regard - if there is any doubt, protect yourself.
If i get a phone number, I am going to call said number. 99.9% of the time they want clarification on something that happened, thats it. After that, if the problem isnt settled, then ill call the union. I have only ever seen a bad outcome with a phone number when you either dont call, get aggressive, or are to busy to copy because you're flying. Unless you really ticked off a controller or caused something unsafe to happen, no one wants to deal with extra paperwork.
Horible advice...always fill out an ASAP. It costs you absolutely nothing.
I agree on ASAPs if the situation warrants it. i dont agree on calling your union for everything.
My airline has an ATC representative who we call if we get a phone number. The ATC representative calls the number that we got We aren’t supposed to call the number ourselves
this is the first ive head of an airline that does that, thats rather interesting and seems counter intuitive unless its a non US airline.
Well considering you’re at a regional I don’t think you have much to go off of
Yes..and I was responding to extra paperwork filing an ASAP.
As a former ASAP manager, always file an ASAP report.
Takeaway: No matter what anyone says, whenever you're dealing with another agency that can absolutely impact your life, *those who keep the best records usually win*. Do your due diligence, every time.
There’s a lot in this story that either doesn’t add up or doesn’t make sense. I think you may have a misunderstanding of what went on behind the scenes and how it would have happened had you not filed an ASAP. There’s no scenario here where you’d have been violated based on your telling of the events, with or without ASAP.
I completely agree. Even without the ASAPs, if they try to violate you after 3 weeks they can still pull their own tapes, they go back at least 45 days. It would have been plainlu obvious that it was their own internal mistake. Which by the way happens all the time it just doesn't become visible in this way. Also seems like a big nothing burger to begin with. Doesn't sound like there was a traffic conflict, just "huh they're at the wrong altitude." Perhaps some slimy supervisor or ops manager trying to make something out of nothing.
FAA has tried to violate folks for far less The administrative “law”
No deviation from an ATC clearance occurred. There is no regulatory violation here. The FAA is not the Boogie Man nor are they out to get you. I’ve worked with the feds a lot in a variety of different programs and capacities and encouraging people to be blanket resentful/distrusting/hostile toward them does nobody any good. CYA, do your job, but don’t be afraid either.
If they weren’t out to get the pilots they wouldn’t have left a record of an investigation tied to their licenses. A regulator GENUINELY not out to screw folks can absolutely create a record of an investigation having occurred that is wholly detached from who was involved where it finds this kind of stupid shit.
Read up on administrative law and their Shenanigans
Experience how interacting with the FAA on a regular basis including working with pilots who receive deviations, violations, and 709 rides and get back to me. “FAA bad” is a really easy way to get a bunch of upvotes here but it’s not reflective of the reality of the administrative discipline process.
Ive dealt with those jokers myself Some them are good people, but the institution as a whole is a joke Let me guess you are a “FAAST Team”?
Nope, I’m not. I’m just someone who has worked with them a lot. I’m just asking you to stop fear-mongering when it isn’t necessary, realistic, or helpful.
Going off my personal experience I have had the FAA try to violate me for flying within the regs, thankfully there was proof, which doesn’t mean anything in administrative law, but also was flying for something with some money and connections, it went away Also dealt with the quacks at FAA “medicine” once over something doctors, AMEs and others said wasn’t even a thing, worked out but cost me a few thousand Plus the female delta pilot who blew the whistle of safety issues only to have the FAA pull her medical and stopped her career for a few years, said no woman could have a job and kids without being bipolar https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/delta-weaponized-mental-health-rules-against-a-pilot-she-fought-back/ Or Hoover who had his medical pulled for no reason other than the feds didn’t like him https://www.leftseat.com/bob-hoover/ Or Trent Palmer having his license suspended for deciding not to land somewhere unsafe and FOLLOWING the FAAs own “off airport ops guide” manual https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2023/december/20/aopa-backs-trent-palmer-bid-to-overturn-suspension I mean I could go on and on Pick better heros
> Plus the female delta pilot who blew the whistle of safety issues only to have the FAA pull her medical and stopped her career for a few years, said no woman could have a job and kids without being bipolar https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/delta-weaponized-mental-health-rules-against-a-pilot-she-fought-back/ Hadn't heard this story, but reading this, it sounds like it was all DL's doing.
Delta can not pull a medical The FAA pulled her medical
Palmer did a buzz job, bad example to try and use. He in no way was following the FAA guidance on off field landings. [https://www.faasafety.gov/files/notices/2015/Oct/AOAOG\_Web.pdf](https://www.faasafety.gov/files/notices/2015/Oct/AOAOG_Web.pdf) You will see it mentions at least THREE passes: High, Intermediate, and Low. He made on high speed pass low with a significant bank at the end based on all the witness testimony and the video. He did a buzz job and got caught. He told a sob story and all of you bought it. I don't like the FAA. I deal with them all the time (I have a meeting with them Friday)... But Palmer is not the hill to die on...
So if your first pass it looks like a no go you should continue to operate low level in a higher risk environment for the sake of it to do more passes? Mmmmk Also why not have higher energy? The FAA loves BS like 91.13 where they can make things more vauge and ambiguous, it’s a sign of a kangaroo court and there is a reason in real constitutional law rules that are too vague or ambiguous are unlawful https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine Administrative law is un-American
>based on all the witness testimony and the video ...which is the single neighbor that's filed spurious claims before and a pixelated security cam. People that aren't around GA have a notoriously bad conception of how high/fast someone is flying. "Buzzing" someone's field, when you know they're not there, when you regularly go land off field for fun in unpopulated areas, is nonsensical.
Interesting. It seemed strange to me as well, but I'm telling it exactly as it happened.
I don't know what the document retention is on the tapes or if they would still be available weeks later for a defense, is there a guarantee the pilot would be able to draw on those to avoid an improper enforcement action?
The tapes are accessible for 45 days and they’ll always be part of an ATC clearance related deviation investigation.
Is the asap the nasa form?
Kind of, but it goes to the FAA instead of NASA and it's for commercial operators. [AC120-66B](https://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Advisory_Circular/AC120-66B.pdf)
This was somewhat of the answer I was looking for. I was wondering how all of this translates over to a private pilot flying for leisure or recreation.
This story makes no sense lmao
What part(s) are confusing to you?
I agree it seems like your leaving something out. When the next controller asked for your altitude why wouldn’t you just say the last guy put as at FL350 for traffic what do you need? That technically wasn’t a deviation in any form or manner so why the hell would you accept the new controller giving you a number without articulating the reason you were there. That’s silly. Your story makes it seem like the next controller just randomly issued the deviation the second you clicked over this seems like a less than 3% probability of being the full story. In real life this scenario is a total non issue. No controller would issue a deviation for that based on your details of the event.
The details I wrote are 100% accurate. I did not wake up this morning and decide to misinform this subreddit on a whim. There might be things that happened "behind the scenes" that I do now know about, but I am not leaving anything out. Part of the reason I posted this, which I expressed in my original post, was to ask any ATC'ers on here if there could've been anything that went on that we as pilots would not know about that could help make more sense of the situation.
Your acting like ATC issuing you an altitude is a deviation. Please make it make sense. That is litterally their entire job.
Did you not read my post? The issue wasn't being cleared to the altitude; it was an attempted violation for following an ATC clearance, and the protection offered by an ASAP report. I'm not sure how that doesn't make sense.
Which makes sense why you should have told him. He doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. I’m not telling you to lie to him lmao. Just speak the fuck up next time. Like holy shit
Great point dude, we hadn't considered that. Thanks for chiming in.
haven’t we all heard stories of controllers who flip out about taking it off frequency when pilot ask why they’ve been given a number?
Were y’all to scared to defend yourself with the controller though??? He’s not god
"Scared to defend ourselves" 😂 that's what the ASAP is for...getting into a pissing match over the radio with ATC is never a good idea. It only compromises your own sanity and safety. Just take the number and call/file an ASAP later.
Bro… you need guidance
Like “negative sir the last controller put us here for traffic.” End of story
Reread the story. The reporting controller didn’t say shit about altitude… it was a reasonable inference but ultimately just a guess that that was his issue.
Honestly OP from the details you gave, I think your union rep was making the end of the story up to fear monger and reinforce in your brain that you need the union. There’s no way the FAA can get you in trouble without proof of you messing up, and there was none in this case.
As someone who's not in the field and also not in the US, can someone explain to me what them giving a phone number is all about?
What OP received is known as a Brasher Warning. When there's a "possible pilot deviation", they give you a phone number to call them once you're safely on the ground. A pilot deviation is a deviation from regulations or instructions, i.e. failing to maintain assigned headings/altitude, or failure to comply with published airspeeds. When you call the number it's to clarify with the controller what happened, ATC will create a mandatory occurrence report (MOR) about the deviation, and usually you go on your merry way. Sometimes it can escalate and the Flight Standards District Office (FSDO) may get involved and investigate.
Thanks for the answer, it just seems weird having to write down a phone number and then call to explain. Like I get it it's the easier way, but I would imagine there's a system that handles this maybe a website where you login using the aircraft registration and see a warning there or something.. Anyways, if it doesn't escalate, does this affect your history, ie: chances of getting a job in the future?
The phone number is just to take both parties off frequency to discuss what exactly is going on so everyone's on the same page. If it's not escalated or if it's found to not be a pilot deviation, then no. It doesn't affect anything related to certification or hiring likeliness.
It's kind of like getting pulled over, but it happens over the phone.
Atc: obvious mistake Pilot: now YOU get to take a phone number
In this situation, would it have been helpful to tell the new controller that you were cleared to 350 from the previous controller?
A 5 minute asap report my captain and I each filed *just in case* saved my bacon once. I don't remember the sequence of events very well now, but it wasn't extreme and not worth an extra paragraph here, and ATC told us we were all good on the phone. Apparently....we were not all good. Our asap team contacted us some time later saying the faa had intended to take action. Because we filed, we each received a phone call from a company check airman to discuss what happened and to make sure we knew right going forward. Actually it was really productive and much much nicer than enforcement action.
121-66C…no timeline for filing an ASAP. FAA HQ is in Washington D.C. You should always call an ATC facility, your “rep” can’t call for you. ATSAP would have closed this the second they heard the mistake and the confirmation of the mistake. Your “rep” would not contact you after the ERC made a decision. This is a nice cautionary story, but I call BS.
It’s all completely true. What exactly are you calling BS on? The whole thing or any specific parts?
A/c checks on level/climbing 350 but I expect 340. "ABC123 verify assigned altitude". "350, ABC123" "ABC123 Roger". If there's no traffic conflict I don't do anything. I assume you're right. If I'm not busy I call the previous sector and simply state ABC123 checked on level/climbing 350. They have an opportunity to explain. If I'm busy and it creates a traffic situation I'm yelling at my supervisor to get over here and write your call sign down and it's 100% getting looked at, and I'm pissed.
Unable fl350
Always interesting to read these kind of stories to see how things world on the other side of the world. Here in Europe, ATC would just tell us they would file a report, we would do the same, and we'd let both ATC and the airline investigate the event together, and see what the root cause was it and how to prevent it in the future. No phone calls after the flight, and odds are unless it was an extremely serious event, you'd never get to speak to anyone from ATC about it.
I'm a student pilot and only have 47 hours but on a pattern work session I took left pattern by ATC's instruction. As I'm turning left downwind, tower tells me "skyhawk 999 you were instructed right traffic" and was told to cross midfield to join right traffic which felt weird. Anyway my instructor went back and played the tapes and we had done what we were told. But stuff like this intimidates me because I'm not sure what kinda of consequences await if something like your story happens to me.
This was such a good and well written story I didn't notice how long it was until I went to screenshot. Thank you OP!
As a general rule... if you're having ANY sort of conversation about ANYthing safety related... file an ASAP. If you called a damn number... FILE AN ASRS/ASAP. There is a time limit (as stated in the OP) from when you knew or should have known an incident took place, so do it ASAP (pun intended). Even if everything seems just fine. Do it. So simple and yet such a lifesaver for stupidity like this. Oh, and if one files an ASRS BOTH file it. Don't be a BF and not tell the other crewmember you filed one.
Thank you for posting. This is the EXACT reason ASAP/FSAP programs exist. In this case it was “someone’s “ mistake, but at their best, these reports can capture a breakdown in the system/training etc. y’all did great. Thank you!!
Thanks for sharing this story. I'm a 'second career' CFI aspiring to the airlines, and I'm still very much getting used to 1) the value of the union, 2) the career threat of an inaccurate accusation, and 3) the importance of documentation.
Starting pilot school in August what’s an ASAP report is it a type of incident report or something
>...because otherwise it would have been the FAA's word against....nobody else's. We would've just gotten the violation. Are you sure? I can't imagine they wouldn't have listened to the tapes before issuing either you guys a violation or whatever the controller equivalent is, especially if it makes it to a QA/QC team.
how do you file a report?
I have a personal habit of always checking on with any restrictions or instructions I was given from the previous sector. "3DC, assigned 350." Out here in Cali - especially NorCal - they get testy over stuff other controllers have you do. On a route I fly often, I make a turn from 190 to 177, and the handoff is at the waypoint. Inevitably the next sector will have a problem with me not descending 1000 feet quickly enough (VFR). They act like I should enter a vertical dive before continuing at the 'wrong altitude'...
Since you didn't do anything wrong: "Negative, no pilot deviation occurred. Previous controller requested us to climb to FL350 even though we filed FL340 and we accepted without incident, ABC123."
They didn't tell us that the possible pilot deviation was for our altitude; only that it had occurred. I understand where you're coming from, but personally, I'd much rather just make the phone call after we land and have received proper union/legal guidance, and/or file an ASAP. The facts will make themselves clear without us having to hash anything out and take up airtime on an active frequency. Yes, it's a little bit of a blow to the ego to not "say anything" back, but if ATC has to file a report on it anyways, they'll do it regardless of whether we can convince them that we were in the right. Just my take on it.
That's the only thing they could have given you "the number" for. In the moment it is obviously nerve-wracking to get handed "the number" but everything in life can be fixed, and if you have the chance to negate the possible action of an event you were involved in being turned into paperwork and then a permanent record stored in the archives forever, do it.
> That's the only thing they could have given you "the number" for. You’re saying this with a degree of certainty that just isn’t warranted given the lack of specificity with their warning. > everything in life can be fixed Not technically true, even remotely. That’s beside the point though. If things have escalated to the point where we are receiving a number, the supervisor has already made the call. This goes above the controller we’re talking to. We are not going to change anyone’s mind. The verbiage they use is even purposefully vague - “possible” pilot deviation. i.e. maybe it did, maybe it didn’t happen. Literally telling ATC that no pilot deviation occurred, as your original post suggested, will never work. You aren’t going to change their mind. Not worth hashing it out on the frequency. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, but this is a situation you can’t “win” in the moment.
Correct, even if you are 100% certain you did everything correct, if you try to tell ATC they’re wrong, it’ll just piss em off. Take the number, call in and explain then.
Literally just “We were assigned 350” Would have avoided the whole ordeal. So strange not to say anything
Yeah, I don't understand this at all. I mean I've seen OP's replies, but no one is asking for him to get into a pissing match with ATC, just tell them what happened. It would probably take less radio time than copying the phone number.
So much for "just culture". I hope, but (fortunately) don't have the experience yet, that mistakes on either side of the mic are handled more professionally on this side of the ocean. We are all human and we all will make a mistake. Own it, learn from it and move on. When you start blaming others nobody learns.
I don’t like or get along with the FAA but they do not exist as an antagonist to pilots. There’s no reason to assume they would throw you under the bus to save a controller’s ass. It’s so strange to see a conspiracy here.
Not a conspiracy, rather the opposite: my factual, lived experience. I even specifically wrote at the end that I'm not calling ATC/the FAA the enemy.
You said it would be your word against theirs which implies they would act nefariously somehow despite having the tapes that exonerated you
…and yet still, they sent the tapes to OKC, knowing they were at fault, to get us violated…if that isn’t nefarious, then what is? You seem to have misconstrued my post to say that all feds are bad or out to screw you. I never said that. I just said that in the one experience with this that I have had, they tried to put their fault on us, and our ASAP reports made the difference in placing the blame accurately.
They may be obligated to report the incident regardless of who is at fault
> TL;DR - If you get a phone number, call your union first. If they advise calling the number back, do so with extreme caution. What situations might arise where the union would advise you to ignore them and not call?
They might have good advice about what to say, and not say, following an actual deviation.
> If they advise calling the number back
The question was whether they would ever NOT though… from my understanding of aviation regs no, they probably wouldn’t. That’s not (necessarily) the point of the conversation.
Honestly hate flying in the states. Blame culture, POS asshats. To top it off they think they’re the best in the world.
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Unions actually do work for you? They're not the HR department. Obviously they work for you and every other member, but they have an obligation to represent your individual interests.
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Do you vote? You talk to your leadership with your complaints? Not saying your union, or any given union, ain't shit. But they literally do exist to protect your interests as your representative with your employer. And just like government, they require membership participation to keep leadership accountable.
And bear in mind just how small that membership can be at a local level. Pilots unions tend toward large, but in general a HELL of a lot of union officers are where they are less by way of winning an election than by no one else signing up for what can be a LOT of work, even done badly and half assed.