On May 11, 8:08 pm, Jose wrote:
Expect to get
a lot of questions about the limitations of a commercial pilot
operating under part 91 (i.e. what you cannot do w/o being 135).
Expect some of those situations to get pretty complicated (i.e. you
start out on a local photography flight, the photographer asks you if
you'll drop him off at point X rather than back at the airport).

I take it the answer would be no. But what about you start out on a
local photography flight, you get diverted and have to land. As it
turns out, this is near where the photographer needs to be, so he
decides not to fly back when the reason for the diversion ends?

Jose


My guess would be since the passenger is paying for a photography
flight, not a charter flight, it should be allowed. The only way for
it to be illegal would be if the passenger paid for the flight,
knowing he would land somewhere else. Since the diversion was
incidental, I don't think it could be considered common carriage. I
don't do that kind of flying, so I'm not totally sure.

There are 4 rules that determine whether a flight is common carriage
or not. 3 of these rules are very clear cut (people or property, from
place to place, for hire) and the last one (holding out) is really
vague. Basically if the FAA says you're holding out, you're holding
out. I believe there's an AC published (AC 120-12A)that goes into
detail what is holding out. To quote it directly, "the issue is the
nature and character of the operation".

So if the pilot was doing an honest diversion, it should be OK. If the
pilot was doing a **WINK** **WINK** "diversion", he would get in
trouble. At least thats how I see it.