AOPA Pilot Magazine - July 2015 - 94

P&E

94 |

NEVER AGAIN

the end of part one of that six-part FDC
notam. I started at the beginning of part
two without realizing I was actually joining the second line of the first TFR ring and
the first line of the second TFR ring, and
so on. I actually had to re-plot the rings a
couple of times after the incident before I
finally figured out what had tripped me up.
I also got firsthand experience with
the FAA's enforcement process. Over the
next 18 months, my lawyer and I discovered a number of startling facts. Regarding
the ADS-B TFR display on my iPad, the
FAA admitted the ADS-B broadcast was
"incomplete." The FAA regional administrator wrote that "the FAA attempts to
issue a graphical depiction of restricted
airspace for the convenience of pilots,
the FAA is not required to do so, and the
absence of a graphical depiction does
not render a published flight restriction
invalid." My use of the EFB to obtain my
DUATS briefing was also ruled a violation

of FAR 91.103(a) because it was "not an
FAA-approved source of preflight and
safety of flight information." Apparently
the FAA's QICP certification of the "reliability, accessibility, and security" of the
EFB's network infrastructure somehow did
not apply to retrieving and delivering the
FAA-approved DUATS briefings.
My pilot certificate was suspended for
30 days. I had filed a timely NASA Aviation
Safety Reporting System (ASRS) report.
Yet the FAA's attorney insisted the agency
would not communicate its reasons for
rejecting the waiver of penalty afforded by
the ASRS program. My letters to the FAA
administrator and formal fraud, waste, and
abuse complaints were ignored. My lawyer
and I concluded that appealing the matter would have cost considerably more. We
also did not believe we would get a different ruling, given the case history and the
fact that appeals almost never overturn an
FAA finding.

The lesson I learned the hard way that
day is that the multibillion-dollar ADS-B
capability, according to the FAA regional
administrator, "is not to be used for realtime navigation, that it is only advisory, and
that pilots should contact air traffic control or a FAA Flight Service Station that
provides weather and other safety information." Think about that the next time
you rely on ADS-B information. I wished
I actually had received a traffic alert before
that F-16 almost caused me to lose control
of my aircraft.
AOPA
MIKE MERCER, of Vienna, Virginia, is an

instrument-rated pilot with commercial
and single and multiengine land and sea
ratings. He is a former Air Force officer.

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Pilot Magazine - July 2015