Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire For small plane pilots.

What is min, legal altitude that you are allowed to fly ? Plane passed over my guess less the 50 feet above my cab on the road not just once but twice. and it was not LEO or wild life plane.

Did you get an N number?

Crop dusters fly at about five feet AGL.

1,000’ over populated areas. https://www.faa.gov/about/office_or...dia/FAA_Guide_to_Low-Flying_Aircraft.pdf

From memory, as I'm not current: Assuming class G airspace, the pilot needs to stay 500' away from people and structures, and have enough altitude to deal with an emergency situation.

So, out in the middle of Bumfuque ID/NV/MT etc, lots of video of pilots skimming their bush tires on the surface of water features. Legally.

But, again, I'm now old and feeble, a current pilot would be more likely to give you better info.

No i did not but I know where he lives and he has a private strip at his house this is not the first time i have seen him flying this low has happened a few time in the last two years if he keeps it up he will mess up and i will not worry about it any more. I hope im not around to see it or be part of it.

You weren't in the takeoff/approach path to his strip were you?

If not, you might ask him to keep a little horizontal separation from you when you're driving around. And for that matter, depending on the local geography/foliage, he might not even be aware of your presence. At any rate, bringing it up to him should have him being a bit more circumspect. No one wants to have to talk to the FAA about infractions.

We were always told 500 feet.

No i was not, unless he picked his strip up and turned it. and moved it closer to where we where at at the time

Supposed to be 500'

I would just let the man fly his airplane the way he wants and stop fretting over it. In all likelihood, if he ever screws up and crashes it there are a hundred billion other places he can be other than over your house or your vehicle.

I'm no longer current either but that 500ft sounds right.

How low can you fly above folks?

Depends on how badly you want to scare them. 😀

There are lots of military low level training routes that are in general flown at 500’. Those routes are all over the country. It doesn’t sound like this is the case and the 1000’ rule would come into play.

Years and years ago I was flying a low level route in a Tomcat doing about 480 knots. The route crossed the Blue Ridge Parkway right at a scenic overlook. As we crested the ridge I rolled to a knife edge so as not to have to push negative G across the ridge line. Right below me about maybe 50’ was a guy getting out of a yellow Volkswagen bug with eyeballs the size of tennis balls and a wide open mouth. 😳 It was one of those split second visions that I’ll never forget.

Digital Dan's link is a good read... Long story short, 500' over a random house in the country, 1000' over a congested area (with caveats for takeoff/landing/other safety reasons.

I will say this though: MANY people misjudge the height of aircraft. I'm not saying you did, but many (or maybe most) do. What looks like 50 feet to a normal guy might actually be several hundred feet.

I was on a flight (in a large military aircraft) where we were complained about publicly in a newspaper by another pilot for flying "within a hundred feet of her" while the female Flight Intstuctor was in a Cessna 172. We saw her on our TCAS (traffic avoidance system) and were well clear. Due to the publicity, the Flight Data Recorder was pulled, and we were never within 1 nautical mile from her.

We have A-10's flyover here that are awful low.
I live on the end of a low ridge, they come around it and shoot the gap between two
mountains. Often they lay over on the left wing and I can look into the cockpit and
see the pilot sitting there. I cant imagine they are 165 yards away from us or th at high.

Don't know, don't care.


IT'S AWESOME!

We hear the whistling, and family buck all run out and stand in the yard watching.
Looking exactly like a bunch of Hillbillies.

Today, people want to be called that.
Growing up, it wasn't welcomed.
Tells you who is and who aint.

My grandparents had a farm in Johnson County KS back in the 1960s, that was on the flight path for Olathe NAS Whenever I was visiting them, I freely admit to being one of those gawking kids watching jets flying over low-level. A-4s and A-6s, mostly, in those days.