Busted my first TFR today
Posted by __joel_t@reddit | flying | View on Reddit | 34 comments
Well, today marks my first TFR bust! I've filed my NASA report, but I wanted to share my experience here so others can learn from it.
Not only was today my first TFR bust, it was also the first time I flew the Hudson River Exclusion! It was a bucket list item for me. My home airport is north of the Exclusion, and since I need XC PIC time to get my instrument rating, I decided that after crossing the VZ southbound, I'd continue to KBLM, do a touch and go there so I could log this as XC PIC, then go back north through the Hudson again and back home.
I reviewed the FAA's course on the exclusion last night so everything would be fresh in my mind and I entered the flight route into ForeFlight. This morning, before leaving for the airport, I completed a ForeFlight brief. The ForeFlight map of the Hudson is a complete mess right now with 11 different future TFRs, including 4 Yankees TFRs and 7 presidential TFRs (including duplicates issued for different ARTCCs). However, all of them were safely in the future of my flight, and there were no active TFRs for me to be concerned about. In order to reduce map clutter so I could see ADS-B in traffic better, I turned off the TFR map layer in ForeFlight.
The flight started uneventfully, I made it past the VZ southbound and tuned the CTAF for KBLM. It sounded like they were using runway 32, and I was on the wrong side of the runway. I considered just crossing over well north of KBLM to be on the pattern side, but I figured I'd potentially be in the path of departures, so I instead opted to cross mid-field at TPA+1000 (to avoid any jets), fly for 2 miles before beginning my descent towards pattern altitude, and then make the right turn to enter the left downwind. After hearing complaints from some CFIs on YouTube about people not going far enough out before turning back inbound, I was very conscientious to be 2 full miles away before beginning my descent. I also heard a news helicopter on CTAF saying they were operating west of the field. I acquired them visually and they would be no factor.
As I was making the right turn, I heard a ForeFlight callout that I had entered a TFR. WTF? Looking down at ForeFlight, I remembered I had turned TFRs off, and turning them back on, I was indeed encroaching on the eastern edge of a TFR. I opted to continue my right-hand turn as the quickest way to get out of the TFR. I got maybe a half mile inside the TFR? I entered the pattern, did my touch and go as normal, then after climbing out, looked at the TFR more closely. It was a law enforcement TFR that had become active about 15 minutes before I busted it, and about an hour after I had started my engine. Now the news helicopter on CTAF made more sense, as they were probably covering the law enforcement activity that the TFR was for.
If it hadn't been for the future presidential TFRs blanketing the area, I wouldn't have disabled the TFR layer and would have known about the TFR. (Thanks, Trump! /s) I still think disabling it while over the Hudson to better see other traffic on ADS-B was the right call, but I should have been more paranoid about unscheduled TFRs popping up and turned the TFR layer back on after exiting the Hudson. Also, the presence of a news helicopter could have alerted me that there might have been a law enforcement TFR in the area and to double check for that. Lastly, I think ForeFlight could help here by hiding irrelevant TFRs, for example, when getting data via FIS-B, have an option to only show future TFRs when they're scheduled to go active when you'll be near them.
Anyway, hope some people can learn from my mistake!
69pylote@reddit
“My first” made me chuckle
ltcterry@reddit
Indeed. I feel so left behind.
NecessaryLight2815@reddit
You say your “first” TFR bust. Hopefully you’re last.
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
Agreed, hopefully it's my last. I submitted an ASRS report, described what I plan to do differently in the future to prevent this same thing from happening to me, took an FAA Wings course on TFRs and airspace, read the AC on TFRs (91-63D), and emailed ForeFlight with a feature request to improve TFR displays on the map in flight. If there are other things I could do to avoid this in the future, I'm all ears. I don't think anybody could look at what I've done and not come to the conclusion I'm doing everything possible to avoid repeating this mistake.
As I said, I did a ForeFlight briefing, which should record that I read the relevant NOTAMs. Plus, given the NOTAM popped up while I was in the air, that doesn't seem to be relevant here. There's no way reading NOTAMs preflight would have caused this.
Regarding the language used, I see people on here post about their "first" in-flight emergency or "first" in-flight engine failure, and I don't see anybody chastising them about saying it's their "first like it's the first of many."
Stop acting all sanctimonious.
NecessaryLight2815@reddit
Sanctimony coming from a 16,000 hour airline pilot? I didn’t get where I am from busting TFR’s, that’s for sure! Take it as friendly advice. You say you’re all ears but then you get upset when someone calls out your choice of verbiage. Your “first” of anything in aviation is always a fun story to tell, when it’s not from a mistake. It does sound as though you have covered all the bases afterwards, and like I said, you’ll be fine.
earthgreen10@reddit
you don't need solo hours for IR right? that's optional i believe
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
You need 50 XC PIC hours for IR. They don't need to be solo but can be.
earthgreen10@reddit
do you cover your windshields or wear foggles when flying solo IR?
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
No, that's illegal. If you do simulated instrument (e.g., foggles), you're required to have a safety pilot, and the safety pilot has to have unobstructed view outside (so you can't cover the windshield).
earthgreen10@reddit
So when you fly solo, how do you prove you were instrument flying and not vfr?
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
I don't do instrument flying when solo because I'm not instrument rated. So when flying solo, I need to be VFR, keeping my eyes outside the plane, and it's illegal for me to fly into clouds. When I get instrument rated, and I fly solo in actual IMC, then logging it is on the honor system.
Goop290@reddit
"My first" XD
Capital-Cricket-1010@reddit
i have over 3000 hours and haven’t busted my first tfr yet. thats quite the accomplishment, congratulations
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
Congratulations to you as well, I guess? To be clear, you mean you haven't knowingly busted a TFR yet. It's possible you have and just never realized it. The only reason I knew was I had ForeFlight on my iPad connected to a FIS-B source, and if I hadn't had that, I would have never known.
TobyADev@reddit
Don’t the faa call and shout at you? that’s what the CAA do
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
They haven't called me yet, and it would take some time for them to find me personally (the plane is registered to a club). Plus, they'd need some way to know that I busted the TFR -- while there is ADS-B, the FAA is prohibited by law from using that to start an investigation. As long as I didn't cause any problems (and there wasn't traffic near me, so I don't think I did), I don't think they'd care that much.
TobyADev@reddit
So in other words - keep quiet and hope ATC haven’t reported you, and that NASA form should cover you if anyone comes knocking. I assume?
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
From my understanding, ATC is overworked and unless you cause a problem for them, they don't care about policing the skies like this. Their primary responsibility is safety. The FAA generally understands that people make honest mistakes, and as long as the violation wasn't intentional or reckless, they don't take a punitive approach. Rather, they try to take an approach of learning so that you can improve safety. Punishing people for minor, unintentional mistakes tends to be counter productive as it creates a culture of covering mistakes up, rather than learning from them. The NASA report is sort of a get-out-of-jail-free card (again, as long as the violation wasn't intentional) because the FAA views it as the pilot making an effort to improve aviation safety, and they want to encourage and incentivize that behavior.
TobyADev@reddit
Exactly, as long as it wasn’t intentional or reckless/dangerous, ATC likely won’t report you. I know of people who’ve gone a decent amount into controlled airspace around where I fly and haven’t been reported for it
Swimming_Way_7372@reddit
My boy Hank has over 20,000 hours and never went into a TFR and he can bench press 250, So what's the big deal.
TobyADev@reddit
Surely this isn’t on you. During planning sure but it wasn’t there. Let’s say you lost WiFi/mobile data signal, how are you meant to know it’s in place? That’s ridiculous..
Sounds like you did the right thing nonetheless
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
Thanks, though as PIC I'm ultimately responsible. I was actually using FIS-B over ADS-B in, but the point still stands that it could be hard to know. Normally on an XC of this length, I'd get flight following, and ATC could tell me about the TFR that popped up. Of course, while in the Hudson River Exclusion, I needed to be on CTAF, and I didn't think it worth it to try to get flight following for the 25 miles from the end of the Exclusion to KBLM (I like to switch to CTAF 15 miles out to start building situational awareness, so it would only be about 10 miles of flight following).
Still, it's a good reminder that you can do nearly everything "right" and accidentally wander into a TFR. That's the point of my post and also the NASA report.
TobyADev@reddit
In all fairness I’d be glad knowing that you did everything right that YOU could at the time
Interesting that you have restricted areas over law enforcement searches. We don’t
Dry-Engineering1776@reddit
This doesn’t sound like you’re at fault. You’re being very responsible and doing everything one would be expected to do for a preflight. Relying on iPads is so crazy now and without them in places like you wrote about is simply impossible. You did your best. I’d fly with you
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
Thanks! Regardless of "fault," I was still PIC and so ultimately responsible for what happened. I also think it's a good data point about how this can happen, both for other other pilots as well as the FAA -- which is the whole point of filing a NASA report.
PterodactylTurd@reddit
Always get a Bravo clearance, much safer that way and you'll get a squawk code so you don't have to worry about the Yankee Stadium and MetLife TFRs that turn active mid-flight. Just FYI the TFR was listed 2 or 3 days ago in Garmin pilot (I know, don't drag me but I couldn't resist their new IFR charts). Usually filing a NASA report and taking a relevant Wings course BEFORE an FAA rep contacts you (IF they do)l at all) seems to keep them happy based on some of my friends experiences. It happens; we learn through experience!
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
Just so I understand, you're saying the roughly 1-hour long law enforcement TFR to the west of KBLM was listed 2 or 3 days ago in Garmin Pilot? Not all the Trump and Yankees TFRs, but the random law enforcement TFR?
BigOwen9@reddit
Try getting a bravo clearance when flying the Hudson Skyline. Makes it way easier in my opinion.
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
For sure! I want to try that as well. I wanted to do the Exclusion first and then compare that experience with the experience of flying the Skyline Route in the Bravo. Flying below the tops of the skyscrapers is certainly awe-inspiring!
MattCW1701@reddit
Did you verify that it applied to all aircraft? I’ve seen some that only apply to drones, but appear anyways.
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
I did not. I felt there were more important things to do with my attention than go heads down looking to see if it were a drone-only NOTAM (this was a solo flight), and by the time I had a chance to look in detail, it was gone. Sadly, I'm not aware of any sort of NOTAM archive either.
autonym@reddit
I'm not sure you're even at fault here. The TFR didn't appear until after you'd taken off, and pilots are not required to have the capability to detect new TFRs in flight. It's generally prudent to use the capability if you have it, but you had a good reason to turn it off (after you'd carefully the pre-flight TFRs for relevance).
__joel_t@reddit (OP)
Thanks. Agreed, it's a bit of an edge case, but I still want to own up to it and be more mindful that this can happen in the future. Besides, that's the point of filing a NASA report -- even if it's not my "fault" the data can be used to try to improve safety for everyone, which also is why I'm publicly posting it here.
rFlyingTower@reddit
This is a copy of the original post body for posterity:
Well, today marks my first TFR bust! I've filed my NASA report, but I wanted to share my experience here so others can learn from it.
Not only was today my first TFR bust, it was also the first time I flew the Hudson River Exclusion! It was a bucket list item for me. My home airport is north of the Exclusion, and since I need XC PIC time to get my instrument rating, I decided that after crossing the VZ southbound, I'd continue to KBLM, do a touch and go there so I could log this as XC PIC, then go back north through the Hudson again and back home.
I reviewed the FAA's course on the exclusion last night so everything would be fresh in my mind and I entered the flight route into ForeFlight. This morning, before leaving for the airport, I completed a ForeFlight brief. The ForeFlight map of the Hudson is a complete mess right now with 11 different future TFRs, including 4 Yankees TFRs and 7 presidential TFRs (including duplicates issued for different ARTCCs). However, all of them were safely in the future of my flight, and there were no active TFRs for me to be concerned about. In order to reduce map clutter so I could see ADS-B in traffic better, I turned off the TFR map layer in ForeFlight.
The flight started uneventfully, I made it past the VZ southbound and tuned the CTAF for KBLM. It sounded like they were using runway 32, and I was on the wrong side of the runway. I considered just crossing over well north of KBLM to be on the pattern side, but I figured I'd potentially be in the path of departures, so I instead opted to cross mid-field at TPA+1000 (to avoid any jets), fly for 2 miles before beginning my descent towards pattern altitude, and then make the right turn to enter the left downwind. After hearing complaints from some CFIs on YouTube about people not going far enough out before turning back inbound, I was very conscientious to be 2 full miles away before beginning my descent. I also heard a news helicopter on CTAF saying they were operating west of the field. I acquired them visually and they would be no factor.
As I was making the right turn, I heard a ForeFlight callout that I had entered a TFR. WTF? Looking down at ForeFlight, I remembered I had turned TFRs off, and turning them back on, I was indeed encroaching on the eastern edge of a TFR. I opted to continue my right-hand turn as the quickest way to get out of the TFR. I got maybe a half mile inside the TFR? I entered the pattern, did my touch and go as normal, then after climbing out, looked at the TFR more closely. It was a law enforcement TFR that had become active about 15 minutes before I busted it, and about an hour after I had started my engine. Now the news helicopter on CTAF made more sense, as they were probably covering the law enforcement activity that the TFR was for.
If it hadn't been for the future presidential TFRs blanketing the area, I wouldn't have disabled the TFR layer and would have known about the TFR. (Thanks, Trump! /s) I still think disabling it while over the Hudson to better see other traffic on ADS-B was the right call, but I should have been more paranoid about unscheduled TFRs popping up and turned the TFR layer back on after exiting the Hudson. Also, the presence of a news helicopter could have alerted me that there might have been a law enforcement TFR in the area and to double check for that. Lastly, I think ForeFlight could help here by hiding irrelevant TFRs, for example, when getting data via FIS-B, have an option to only show future TFRs when they're scheduled to go active when you'll be near them.
Anyway, hope some people can learn from my mistake!
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