The Regulatory Framework

The federal rules for aviation are in Title 14 of the Code of Federal Regulations, written 14 CFR. Pilots call them the FARs, the Federal Aviation Regulations. Title 14 is divided into Parts. Three Parts apply to each lesson in this program: Part 61, Part 91, and Part 67 or 68 1.

Three Parts you will use each week

Part 61 is about you. It governs pilot certification 2:

• how a pilot earns a certificate
• which ratings go on it
• what privileges it gives
• what keeps it current.

The answer to "can I carry a passenger yet?" is in Part 61. So is the answer to "when is my flight review due?"

Part 91 is about the flying. It gives the general operating and flight rules for aircraft operated in the United States 3. Part 91 contains:

• right of way
• minimum altitudes
• VFR weather minimums
• required equipment
• the fuel you must carry.

The answer to "can this airplane do this, here, now?" is in Part 91.

Parts 67 and 68 are about your body. Part 67 sets the medical standards and the procedures for the three classes of medical certificate 4. Part 68 is BasicMed. Under BasicMed some pilots fly without a Part 67 certificate after a medical course and a physician's checklist 5.

Other Parts apply less often. Part 1 defines the words. Part 43 covers maintenance. Part 71 designates the airspace. On the first day, name Part 61, Part 91, and Part 67 or 68, and say what each one is for.

The rules are law

Each rule in 14 CFR is federal law. It binds each pilot on each flight, whether or not anyone watches. The FAA writes the rules and enforces them. Enforcement happens at the local Flight Standards District Office 1.

A violation has consequences separate from any accident. The FAA can do three things:

• fine the pilot
• suspend the certificate
• revoke the certificate.

A safe landing does not cancel the violation. The violation stays on the pilot's record.

The FAA wrote many rules in Part 91 after an accident. Each such rule addresses what harmed the pilots in that accident.

Guidance is not regulation

Two FAA documents give guidance on the rules, and neither is law.

The Aeronautical Information Manual, the AIM, is the FAA's official guide to basic flight information and air traffic control procedures in the National Airspace System 6. It describes how the FAA expects a pilot to fly:

• how to enter a traffic pattern
• what to say on the radio
• how to read the airspace
• what a light gun signal means.

The AIM's own front matter says the publication, "while not regulatory, provides information which reflects examples of operating techniques and procedures which may be requirements in other federal publications or regulations" 7.

The FAA cannot charge a pilot with a violation for departing from the AIM. The AIM states the procedures the FAA expects, and a checkride examiner expects the same procedures. A pilot who follows the AIM procedures is rarely wrong.

Advisory Circulars, or ACs, are the FAA's other guidance documents. An AC is an information document the FAA issues to pilots 8. An AC does one of three things:

• gives an acceptable way to comply with a rule
• explains a rule that is often misunderstood
• treats a whole subject, such as wake turbulence.

The Pilot's Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge says ACs "are to be used for information only and are not regulations."

An AC number carries its subject. The first part of the number matches the CFR Part the AC applies to. AC 61-65 is about pilot certification, because Part 61 is. The AC 91 series is about operations, because Part 91 is. A letter at the end shows the revision, so AC 61-65E is the fifth revision of that circular. The FAA website has a search page for the whole set.

The text changes

The rules change. The FAA amended Part 61 in late 2024, and the wording of the recent-experience rule changed with it. Part 91 changes most years. A rule a student learns today can have different wording on the day of the checkride.

The current text is in one place: the eCFR at ecfr.gov, an online edition of the Code of Federal Regulations, updated daily 9. Each title page shows the date of its last amendment.

A printed FAR/AIM book is a copy of the rules taken once a year. A study guide is a copy of that copy. A figure memorized from an old copy can be wrong today. The examiner gives the checkride under the rules current on the day of the test.

When a number matters, open the eCFR and read the section. Reading the section takes a minute. The FAA expects a pilot in command to read the current rule.

The flight of N5714W

On December 16, 2012, a 63-year-old private pilot flew alone from Summerville, South Carolina, toward Fayetteville, North Carolina, in a 1963 Piper Cherokee. He held an instrument rating. Fayetteville reported an overcast ceiling at 300 feet. His vacuum pump failed on the approach, and he lost his gyro instruments in cloud. He told the controller the best thing was to go to his alternate, which had visual conditions. The controller vectored him back toward the approach instead, and he lost control and died seven and a half miles short of the runway.

He earned the instrument rating in 2003, on his third checkride attempt. On the first attempt he failed emergency operations, with special emphasis on partial panel, which is flight without the gyro instruments. He had about 1,006 hours. In the nine years since the rating he logged 4 hours of simulated and 16 hours of actual instrument flight.

The tanks were full. An AIRMET for IFR conditions covered the route. He received his instrument clearance in the air and flew north at 5,000 feet.

At 3:10 in the afternoon, on the ILS to runway 4, the airplane began to deviate from the course. The tower asked whether he had the localizer. "Having a little bit of trouble right now," he said. "I seem to have lost some gyros, but I think we're getting there."

His vacuum pump failed. It was nine years old, three years past its six-year replacement recommendation. The attitude indicator and the heading indicator stopped. He was in cloud with a turn coordinator and an airspeed indicator, and he was not proficient at partial-panel flight.

The tower cancelled the approach a mile from the runway and told him to climb on runway heading. He turned east instead. The tower handed him back to approach control, which assigned a heading. He overshot the assigned heading by 90 degrees, and the controller asked whether he had a problem. At 3:18 he answered:

"OK, I'm currently no gyro. I think the best thing for me is to climb a little bit and go to my alternate of Columbus, or some point south."

His plan was correct. Columbus County, 42 miles to the south, had ten miles of visibility and a ceiling at 5,500 feet. He had fuel for hours. The controller cleared him toward it. A minute later the controller asked whether he was okay. He answered: "Uh, no, I'm not okay right now."

He never said the word emergency. The controller did not understand what the loss of the gyros meant in cloud, and asked whether he wanted to come back to Fayetteville. The pilot began to answer, "uh, the best thing to," and did not finish the sentence. The controller vectored him back toward the ILS.

For four minutes, heading south at a higher altitude, he was in visual conditions and flew straight and level. Then the controller turned him back into cloud for another approach. At 3:31 he reported established on the localizer. Twenty seconds later the airplane rolled right and struck the trees inverted, seven and a half miles short of the runway.

The NTSB's probable cause is his loss of control in cloud after the gyro failure. Contributing factors were the failed vacuum pump, "the inadequate assistance provided by FAA ATC personnel," and the controllers' training 10. The report adds that had anyone understood the emergency, "it is likely the pilot would have been vectored to an airport with VFR conditions for an uneventful landing."

The video below is the AOPA Air Safety Institute's reconstruction of the flight. It uses the radar data and the controller recordings.

Where the accident chain could have been broken

The accident was six decisions. Each is listed below with its PAVE category and the decision that would have ended the flight safely. Three of the six safe decisions take one sentence on the radio.

91.3: responsibility and authority

14 CFR 91.3 is three paragraphs long. Paragraph (a):

(a) The pilot in command of an aircraft is directly responsible for, and is the final authority as to, the operation of that aircraft. 11

Directly responsible means the pilot in command does not share the responsibility. The controller, the instructor, the owner, and a passenger who is a pilot do not hold it. Final authority means the controller does not hold it. A controller keeps airplanes apart and helps when asked.

A controller's vector is not a decision about your airplane. It is a request. You can decline it. The word for declining is "unable," and it is a complete transmission.

The NTSB wrote Safety Alert 055 after this accident and four others. It tells pilots to do three things:

• take command of the flight
• tell the controller what they need
• say "unable" without fear.

Its last sentence: "declaring an emergency isn't giving up control—it's taking control!" 12.

Paragraph (b) gives the authority its scope:

(b) In an in-flight emergency requiring immediate action, the pilot in command may deviate from any rule of this part to the extent required to meet that emergency.

Any rule of Part 91 includes the altitude rules, the airspace rules, and the VFR weather minimums. The sentence carries three limits:

• the emergency must be in flight
• it must require immediate action
• the deviation goes only as far as the emergency requires.

The authority is limited to those three conditions.

Paragraph (c) is about the report:

(c) Each pilot in command who deviates from a rule under paragraph (b) of this section shall, upon the request of the Administrator, send a written report of that deviation to the Administrator.

The report is due upon request, not automatically, and not within ten days. If the FAA asks, the pilot writes down what happened and why. Most of the time no one asks. A pilot who avoids declaring an emergency because of the paperwork avoids paperwork that usually does not exist.

Two agencies, two jobs

The National Transportation Safety Board wrote the report on N5714W, not the FAA. The NTSB is an independent agency charged with investigating transportation accidents and issuing safety recommendations 13. The NTSB does not write flight rules and cannot suspend a certificate. Its job is to find out what happened and to say what must change.

The FAA does three things:

• writes the regulations
• certifies pilots and aircraft
• enforces the rules.

The split is deliberate. The investigator is not the regulator whose rule is under investigation.

The NTSB's rules for pilots are in Title 49, Transportation, at 49 CFR Part 830. Part 830 answers three questions: what counts, whom to call, and what not to touch.

What counts

Part 830 depends on three definitions 14.

An aircraft accident is "an occurrence associated with the operation of an aircraft which takes place between the time any person boards the aircraft with the intention of flight and all such persons have disembarked, and in which any person suffers death or serious injury, or in which the aircraft receives substantial damage." The window opens at boarding and closes at disembarking. A prop strike while taxiing to the runway is inside the window.

A serious injury is one that does any of these:

• needs hospitalization for more than 48 hours, starting within 7 days of the injury
• fractures any bone, except simple fractures of fingers, toes, or nose
• causes severe hemorrhage, or damage to a nerve, muscle, or tendon
• involves any internal organ
• involves second- or third-degree burns, or burns over more than 5 percent of the body.

Substantial damage is "damage or failure which adversely affects the structural strength, performance, or flight characteristics of the aircraft, and which would normally require major repair or replacement of the affected component." The rule then lists what is not substantial damage:

• engine failure or damage limited to one engine
• bent fairings or cowling
• dented skin
• small punctured holes in the skin or fabric
• ground damage to propeller blades
• damage to landing gear, wheels, tires, flaps, engine accessories, brakes, or wingtips.

A wrinkled wing spar after a hard landing is substantial damage. A bent wingtip and a flat-spotted tire are not, at any repair cost.

An incident is any other occurrence that affects or could affect the safety of operations. N5714W was an accident for two reasons: a fatal injury and a destroyed airplane. Most events in student flying are neither.

The call

After an accident, the operator notifies the nearest NTSB office immediately, and by the most expeditious means available 15. In practice the notification is a phone call to the NTSB Response Operations Center, at the number printed in the rule's footnote. There is no 24-hour grace period and no waiting for the mechanic's opinion. If the event meets the definition, the operator calls.

The rule requires the same immediate call for a list of serious incidents, even when no one is hurt and the airplane is undamaged. The ones that can happen to a private pilot are:

• flight control system malfunction or failure
• inability of any required flight crewmember to perform normal duties because of injury or illness
• in-flight fire
• aircraft collision in flight
• damage to property other than the aircraft estimated over $25,000
• release of all or part of a propeller blade, except when caused only by ground contact.

The rest of the list applies to turbine, large multiengine, glass-cockpit, and air-carrier operations. Paragraph (b) adds one more case: an aircraft that is overdue and believed to have been in an accident.

The report

The phone call is the notification. The report is NTSB Form 6120.1, the Pilot/Operator Aircraft Accident/Incident Report 16. After an accident it is due within 10 days. If an overdue aircraft is still missing, it is due after 7 days. For a listed incident, the operator files the report only if the NTSB asks for it.

Under both 91.3(c) and 830.15, the paperwork comes after the event. A deviation report and an incident report are each due only on request. Neither rule is a reason to hesitate on the radio.

The wreckage

Until the NTSB takes custody, the wreckage stays where it is. It can be disturbed or moved only as far as necessary for three purposes 17:

• to remove people who are injured or trapped
• to protect the wreckage from further damage
• to protect the public from injury.

If it must be moved, the operator first makes sketches, notes, and photographs of where everything was.

The rule protects the evidence investigators use to write reports like the one on N5714W. The operator also keeps each record, logbooks included, until the Board releases them. A pilot who moves the wreckage with a friend's trailer breaks this rule.