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Comment by schoen | Hacker News Reader

Under U.S. law, are there circumstances in which it could be acceptable to deliberately crash a plane?

In this case, it clearly wasn't (crashing on public lands with risk of starting a wildfire and polluting them), but if you wanted to crash a plane for a scene in a movie, could you do so? Maybe crashing on private property in a predetermined location with appropriate fire department support and prior notification to air traffic control about your intentions?

Can manufacturers perform genuine crashes (from controlled flight) on private property for safety tests, the way car manufacturers perform tests with crash test dummies?

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In 1984, NASA and the FAA deliberately crashed a remote-piloted Boeing 720 as a test of various safety technologies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_Impact_Demonstratio...

In 2012, a team of television studios crashed a Boeing 727 in Mexico (to film footage) because US authorities would not permit the test: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Boeing_727_crash_experime...

So I'm guessing that outside of very specific scenarios, you would have a hard time getting permission to deliberately crash a plane anywhere in the US.

Yea, I doubt you actually need a specific permit to crash an aircraft in a controlled fashion rather than everything else like operating a huge drone etc. The issue is the YouTuber essentially abandoned control of the aircraft so it could have landed on anything.

Yes, but the comment I was replying to was discussing scenarios other than the one in the article.

Do you know what the source of the crash in this video [1] is?

I’ve wanted to know ever since I saw the same clip in a few films, including Airplane 2

[1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sGQpQabwf8U

It's from FAA crash test involving DC-7 https://youtu.be/Z-So3btcvCQ

I don’t see why not. The FAA didn’t say that his violation was that he intentionally crashed a plane.

> the F.A.A. said he had violated federal aviation regulations and operated his single-engine plane in a “careless or reckless manner so as to endanger the life or property of another.”

> The FAA didn’t say that his violation was that he intentionally crashed a plane.

the FAA did say he wore a parachute (unusual), opened the door before the engine quit, didn't follow procedure to attempt to restart the engine, and intentionally climbed out of the plane to film it rather than attempting to land it.

Yes he probably crashed the plane intentionally, but that’s not the regulation he broke.

Intentionally crashing a plane seems a pretty good example of piloting in a careless/reckless manner that endangers life or property. There's not a specific rule "they shall not crash your plane" but this is more of a catch-all rule for these kind of situations.

There's a big difference between forbidding "crashing a plane" and forbidding "recklessly endangering people and property". The most obvious example being: there are circumstances in which crashing is unavoidable. Sully, for instance, crashed a plane in a way that protected life and property.

It is much more precise to just forbid "endangering people/property" than it is to try to enumerate every action that could be dangerous and then adding exceptions.

is there such a regulation? the part I'm quibbling about is, they do express that he showed intentions

Are you suggesting that intentionally crashing a plane would not constitute operation in a “careless or reckless manner”? So as to endanger the life or property of another?

I think he's suggesting that the FAA regulation he violated was operating the plane in a careless or reckless manner. He did that by intentionally crashing his plane.

I am suggesting that it may be possible to safely, carefully, and legally crash a plane in a controlled scenario.

For instance: https://youtu.be/zuynxwQMad4

I could argue that there are cases where you could crash a plane in careful and not reckless manner. That is with extreme control, planning and probably minimising the potential damages such as environmental by removing as much hazardous stuff as possible. Plus having extensive planning on operation. Still unlikely to get approved, but I see it to be possible.

The FAR does generally make provisions for waivers of the regulations (e.g. 14 CFR 91.903-905 for GA, 14 CFR 107.205 for sUAS). Applications for waivers involve justifying your operation and convincing the FAA that you can conduct it safely. For something like that, they’d want it over a sparsely populated area or a restricted access area and with appropriate ground support for fire / medical. You’d also almost certainly have to file NOTAMs (maybe a TFR).

It's been done, not least for airliner safety testing - there's video out there of an old airliner (707 or 727, I want to say) being deliberately crashed by remote control into a set of spikes in order to observe the breakup.

I assume there's some permitting regime, and of course you'd need to find a place to do it, but probably nothing too onerous by the standard of being able to buy a whole airplane specifically to wreck it.

edit: I was close! It's a Boeing 720, a short-range variant of the 707. https://youtu.be/Jpc32JQXT_0

>I assume there's some permitting regime,

There probably isn't a specific permit or process for two primary reasons.

Firstly, crashing a plane intentionally is a rare thing and (until now, apparently) isn't the kind of thing the riff raff do so there's no reason to throw up barriers to keep the riff raff out nor enough volume requests to warrant a an institutional process for dishing out said denials.

Second, it is naive to expect a government agency to stick their neck out and accept some degree of liability for something like this (which is what approving a comprehensive plan would do). It's not like there's highly developed industry standards for plane crashing they can rely on.

The closest you'll get to a "permit" is probably the FAA knowing your intentions in advance and not objecting.

9/11 truther comments on that clip aside, that looks absolutely brutal.

It's the times. And yeah, for all that it looks and sounds like this might have been relatively survivable with a quick evacuation, there's still a little horror in that cabin view.

Keep in mind that this guy isn't in trouble for crashing his plane per se, the FAA is on him for "careless or reckless manner so as to endanger the life or property of another".

If you're something like a movie studio, you bring in the experts that help you plan a stunt to be done safely. Insured. Plan, plan plan. Also probably get permits, have fire fighters on standby, etc. Basically the exact opposite of "careless or reckless".

It seems you didn't read the article in its entirety.

On the one hand, I’m pretty sure that act of crashing a plane isn’t illegal by itself and there isn’t a regulation that states you must get approval or coordinate with the FAA prior to a crash. But even if you manage to set things up so that you aren’t endangering the public, the moment you leave a flying plane unattended you have turned it into a UAV, and you almost certainly break the FAA’s rules on UAV operations. So if you’re going to crash a plane intentionally you have to ride it all the way to the ground :)

As with car testing, it is usually preferable, on engineering grounds, to perform the tests in a more controlled environment where the parameters can be tightly controlled and the outcomes exhaustively measured.

Here's a description of one such series of tests, and some video:

https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/13578

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORrPSXuBQm8

I’d imagine if they didn’t already have their own land to do this they could rent an old airfield or quarry and get assistance from the FBI like Mythbusters did back in the day to (potentially) blow things up

Somewhere there’s a form that allows you to crash a plane legally, I’d bet. Probably be a much longer form for a commercial plane though

>if you wanted to crash a plane for a scene in a movie, could you do so?

It has been done. I'm pretty sure Howard Hughes wasn't cited for crashing his plane while filming Hell's Angels.

Maybe he should have been, though. Even though he survived the crash and it was an accident, four people died doing the stunts for that movie.

Hell's Angels was released in 1930. The FAA didn't exist until 1958. The Civil Aeronautics Board, which preceded the FAA was formed in 1939. There was the Aeronautics Branch of the Department of Commerce [1] that existed between 1926 and 1934. Their handling of the 1931 Fokker F-10 [2] crash is what led to the creation of the NTSB as a separate agency. Presumably the DoC wasn't that interested in air crashes at the time. Probably understandable, considering the reliability of early aircraft.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_government_role_...

[2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1931_Transcontinental_%26_West...

(Further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_government_role_...)

Flight testing.

Yep. And, they do. Usually it's in a controlled environment. Just like you don't see automakers crash testing on the highways ;).

Here's an example of what it looks like: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbFMogBNUa0

There's not a rule against deliberately crashing a plane because it's not anticipated that anyone would. Of course there are a whole host of rules that would be inevitably violated by doing so in almost all circumstances.

Seems like it's been done in any number of movies, even before CGI, but maybe they used models in most cases.

Could he just say "I panicked"..? I'm sure pilots panic and make mistakes all the time.

Having had the forethought to wear a parachute and the steady nerves to use a selfie stick on the way down, among other things mentioned in the article, would complicate this defense.

Also:

> “During this flight, you opened the left side pilot door before you claimed the engine had failed,” the F.A.A. wrote.

You can say whatever you want, and many people who break the law do exactly that.

But in the end, evidence may show that you are not being truthful. For example, if the evidence demonstrates that you premeditated your actions, then nobody is going to believe that it was a split second mistake.

That would, at best, get you a 709 ride (reexamination by the FAA to see if you really do qualify to hold your pilot certificate) or mandatory re-training. There is no universe in which the FAA would hear that and just say, "lol, totes, we get it man, planes are hard." Responding appropriately to an engine failure is a required skill for even the most basic pilot certificate and if you can't do it, you have no business flying an airplane.

A private pilot's license is a privilege, and being somewhat resistant to panic is one of the prerequisites of that privilege.

When you're in the air alone, there is no one to rely on but yourself, and failure to exercise proper judgment can kill people on the ground. So the FAA has broad leeway to determine that you don't have the right mindset for a private pilot's license.

> A private pilot's license is a privilege

I hate calling things like this a privilege. It's licensed and regulated for the safety and benefit of the people who fly and live underneath airspace (all of us).

There are too many things involving the government that have turned into privileges where it takes knowing someone or being able to afford access to obtain action.

It is a privilege though; just based on:

- Having the money to afford the training for the pilots license

- Having the time to complete the training and stay current

- Having no health issues that may deny you a medical

It is pretty out of reach for most people with out the time / funds for it.

Having the fortune of health/time/money is a privilege. Getting the license after meeting the requirements should automatically follow and not be at the whims of privilege.

I do get what you're saying, but there are people using "privilege not a right" literally to mean that someone gets to decide whether the person is worthy beyond some standard criteria.

Yup I see the distinction and I agree with you. It also means that you will loose that right for breaking any rules / regulations of that license; but the gray area I guess is the unwritten rules governing safety alongside written ones.

We’ll likely see amendments codifying those unwritten rules into existing legislation soon enough.

The FAA are not going to come down on you hard if you panic, but if you're dumb enough to make it clear that you're faking that panic for youtube views, they're going to throw every single book possible at you.

And I doubt this is the final action. FAA can't criminally prosecute but they can refer to the DOJ.

This would actually probably fly just fine … if he hadn’t posted the video with evidence against himself.

NTSB might still investigate and determine the plane has nothing noticeably wrong however.

The NTSB doesn’t even travel to every GA fatal accident, let alone one reported as an old T-craft engine failure with no injuries (assuming the case where he didn’t post the video).

Of course, without the intent of posting the video, that plane doesn’t crash, so the NTSB doesn’t come looking then either.

Yes, but there's a lot of evidence that this was pre planned.

Not exactly crash landing, Nolan said they rammed a Boeing 747 into a building for Tenet.

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