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Quote:

FAA releases radar video of F-16's close call with GA aircraft
By AOPA ePublishing staff

AOPA has obtained a video of the radar return and radio calls for the March 21 incident in which an F-16 pilot flew in close formation with the unsuspecting pilots of a Pilatus PC-12 and a Beechcraft Premier jet flying through an active military operations area. The pilots took aggressive maneuvers to try to prevent a midair.

The F-16 pilot, based out of Luke Air Force Base, was reprimanded. Luke officials have told AOPA that they will alter their local training program to avoid this type of encounter in the future.

AOPA has recommended that the Air Force and the FAA develop a way for center controllers to communicate with military controllers in real time. The two were not communicating at the time of the March incident.

Radar tape:
http://flash.aopa.org/video/F16intercept.wmv

Source: www.aopa.org

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Veteran Joined: Feb 06, 2004 Posts: 385 Status: Offline

Wonder if the the pilot was an IP or a Stud?

Newbie Joined: Mar 11, 2008 Posts: 5 Status: Offline

Bummer for the civilians to be targeted/intercepted/shadowed like that Devil

. Maybe they should stay out of the MOA...!

Veteran Joined: Feb 06, 2004 Posts: 385 Status: Offline

But I'm sure the 16 pilot knew better, wonder what the MOA operating altitudes were? Cant' you fly thru a MOA if in contact with ATC?

vinnie wrote:

But I'm sure the 16 pilot knew better, wonder what the MOA operating altitudes were? Cant' you fly thru a MOA if in contact with ATC?

If you are VFR, you can fly through a MOA anytime without talking to anyone. Technically, you can fly through a MOA IFR if ATC can separate you from whoever is in the MOA. In practice, no non-participating aircraft go IFR through a hot MOA.

In the tape, you hear the Premier driver executing a TCAS RA climb above FL180. The concern was that he was VFR, recieving flight following, and busted the rule about no VFR in Class A airspace.

Why cant a Viper ever show off for me when I'm punching holes in a 172? I say they are lucky!

Veteran Joined: Feb 06, 2004 Posts: 385 Status: Offline

Anybody remember when a Moody 16 took out a civilian south of Tampa?

Newbie Joined: Jan 30, 2008 Posts: 4 Status: Offline

(lurker...just can't bite my tongue any longer...)
This has GOT TO STOP. Guys cruising through active MOA's thinking that military aircraft can deconflict...it's just not reasonable. Not all military aircraft have radars, and contrary to popular belief, the APG-68 doesn't give you God-like SA on all aircraft flying around you. It's quite possible for an aircraft to be unseen by the radar or (gasp) seen by the radar but unseen by the "radar-operator". Any pilot can tell you of close encounters they've had with "stranger traffic" in MOA's, and every encounter is just another close call. Go below or around active MOA's...PLEASE.

In this circumstance, the F-16 was not ONCE within the FAA's definition of "close" (500 feet), contrary to the panicked voice from the civilian pilot stating that they passed within 10 feet. I guarantee you that the F-16 pilot saw this civilian jet the whole time, and believe me, he knew very well what distance he needed to remain out of and also knew much better than this (joker) what those ranges look like in the air.

Maybe instead of getting upset with the fighter pilots they should just listen to the lesson they're being taught, or, at the very least, take responsibility for their mistakes and actions, and don't pass the blame onto someone who's just training to defend your nation in a very small piece of the sky.

Sorry for the rant this issue has just been near and dear to my heart for awhile now...

Veteran Joined: Feb 06, 2004 Posts: 385 Status: Offline

Why was the pilot reprimanded?

Damn losers. Pisses me off. How badass would that be to fly around with an F-16? Cry babies have to ruin the fun.

Talking business, I wonder how those pilots would react if they ever really got intercepted? AOPA sends me those cards with intercept procedures every year. I don't see evasive action on there anywhere. Obviously I don't know exactly what the F-16 was doing, but if I was flying a GA plane and was suddenly in formation with an F-16, I'd watch him to see what he's trying to tell me. I wouldn't immediatly start whining to center that the big, mean F-16 molested me. If it turns out he's not there to intercept, then I'll have one hell of a story to tell my friends.
And as Scratchin' said, they were VFR in a hot MOA.

Elite Joined: Jun 29, 2004 Posts: 961 Status: Offline

vinnie wrote:

Why was the pilot reprimanded?

Because you don't fly "formation" with untrained, unexpecting civilians. It's stupid and dangerous.

wtf. How in the hell is it even legal for civilians to enter military airspace?

Active member Joined: Apr 22, 2004 Posts: 136

First, everyone should remember MOA, Military Operations Area's are shared airspace, according to the FAA. You will hear a number of FAA rep's stress this, especially a retired C-130 and T-38 pilot now enjoying his FAA regional job up in Alaska. http://www.avweb.com/news/atis/this_isnt_mig_alley_197652-1.html (My own personal rant to Mr Rolf is that I designed the Luke Web site and I care more about MOA's than he will ever know, Operations v Operating my a$$, enjoy your cushy job in Anchorage now in the FAA Mr Rolf and realize in all of your flying of heavies and trainers you never utilized a MOA the way a fighter pilot does.)
Anyway, everyone will have to read the url to find out why Mr Rolf is unfortunately regarded as a 'military expert airspace manager' and how he really has no clue about how USAF fighters utilize the MOA's

MOA's regularly have incursions by non-participating VFR civilian traffic. Misconceptions by many General Aviation pilots and corporate pilots that fly through MOA's are that the Military pilots know they are there or are being controlled by some agency utilizing radar. Often this is far from the truth. Scratchin is correct, the APG-68 does what it was designed for very well. But guess what; it wasn't designed for slow moving civilian aircraft. Most fighter planes don't have anything close to TCAS on board. And finally with in the MOA's fighters are often not using any controlling agency for separation from non participating aircraft.
Many GA pilots that I had the fortune to educate (utilizing safety channels and other forums designed to provide safe use of all shared airspace) often came said the same thing "Wow, I didn't know the airspace how the airspace was used and I didn't realize the fighters probably didn't know I was transiting." Unfortunately, a few others said dumb things like "I'm going to fly through it because it’s my right... it is legal for me to do it... I don't like the military grabbing up all the useable airspace so I fly through it to make a point..." or naively say "wow, I was just hoping to get up close".
Most of the time when we find out a GA aircraft is transiting we have to stop the training. Some times entire missions had to be delayed or even cancelled because of VFR traffic. In case any GA pilot wonders what that does... It costs upwards of 20-40 thousand dollars per hour for a 4-8 ship of fighters to fly per hour. It requires missions to be reflown if the mission is degraded to the point syllabus items or mission objectives can't be met, costing more money.
Oh, and Roscoe. This wasn't formation flight. It was an intercept to visually ID the GA aircraft and get a Tail number. The F-16 remained "well clear", utilizing an FAA definition although their definition is very vague. The F-16 radar shows no approach closer than 600 feet.
This was a sensationalization by both the civilian pilots. Oh and even though they say they don't know one another it is a huge coincidence that both airplanes are rented from the same company (used to be shown together on their website) the Pilatus and premier jet. The owner of the company was flying the civilian jet that is heard on the tape and the Pilatus pilot is a lawyer from California.
A lively discussion and much more information can be seen on the baseops net web site:http://www.flyingsquadron.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=13295 and the avweb.com web site.

So these two civilians are flying around at 17,000 feet VFR smack dab through the center of a an active MOA and they are surprised when they get intercepted.

Here is my take.

Why would you not file a flight plan if you wanted to fly at 17,000 feet. That way ATC could control you and keep you clear of the MOA, here is why, because they knew it would be out of their way to go around the MOA, and they probably don't have the performance to climb over it. So they simply stay below FL180 stay "VFR" and transit the MOA hoping not to run into any problems. They most likely do this on a routine basis, and the F-16 driver finally got tired of these bozo's busting his training, so he decided to intercept and get an N number fron him.

The civilian knew he was had and decided to overreact to the situation, and tried to sound alarmed when asking for help in filing a complaint. The part I love is when he asks for the F-16 pilots name and phone number. He will never get it, the military does not have to furnish the pilots name to the FAA, even if the FAA asks. We had a guy that the FAA tried to violate, and Minneapolis center called my desk just asking who the pilot of a certain call sign was becasue he wanted to send him something. Luckily I did not fall for it and it kept him from getting violated.

MOAs are published to top out at FL180. If the GA pilots were around 17.5, they likely thought they were close enough to the top to not interfere. I don't know - I'm only speculating based on what the article said. I agree that these VFR pilots over reacted - but you get idiots in every line of work. The reality of the MOAs is that they are routinely used as high as FL490 - the ones that border my airspace, anyways. Above 180, they are not published as a MOA because everyone is IFR and ATC re-routes everyone around them.

Why go VFR? Most IFR aircraft are on published routes - jet-routes, victor airways, etc. There are several reasons for this, but bottom line is if you are VFR you can go in a straight line burning a lot less fuel and getting there faster.

One other small piece of it could be that MOAs are proposed to go hot a helluva lot more often than they are actually used.

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