"buttman" wrote in message
ups.com...
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.


On this one I agree with you.

As a former student pilot, and presumably a future student pilot and then
private pilot, I have no expectation of ever having this particular
discussion with a DE. However, there are a few parallels in debates
regarding the sharing of expenses and of business vs commercial flying: and
some of those can become esoteric to the point of becoming ridiculous.

A lot could also depend upon the personality of the examiner and any recent
cases and guidance he may have received. Quite a long time ago, I was
sitting in the (then) local airport restaurant and one of those present, who
I believe was primarily a charter pilot, related a story about his oral exam
for either instrument or commercial. It was long and convoluted, if true,
and he was sent back for further study a couple of times--until he happened
to answer a question with something like "I will have to look that up."
According to the story, he then passed the exam.

Given the plausible and uncommon situation described above, plus a moment of
greater insight than I usually display, I might try to dance around the
question with something like: "Well, if I was the pilot, I would have
decided where to land based upon safety of flight and whatever services
might be needed while on the ground; and I think that it would be unwise to
attempt to force him/her back into the airplane. Can you offer any guidance
in case anything similar ever occurs?"

Peter