Oh Lordy, what now?

Good Lord! It’s happened again. General Aviation has an incident that will forever go down in history as a black mark on its reputation. I’m sure everyone has heard about the Texas pilot with a grudge against the IRS and government and subsequently used his plane to “prove a point”. Although, I can understand his frustrations, he has chosen a path that could, forever, cause us law-abiding pilots to endure heavy restrictions. What irony… he hated the restrictions and frustrating interactions with dealing with the IRS (i.e. government). Then he goes out, using his plane as a weapon, and tries to show that he ultimately has control of the situation; or so he thought.

Did he not think about what would happen after the mayhem he caused? He complained about the loss of freedoms General Aviation went through after 9/11, yet he set forth a path that could force us into further restrictions. As my significant other, John has lamented; we’re probably going to have to file a flight plan any time we want to fly, no matter what. Or worse yet, a protected airspace will be placed around every federal building in the United States. Now that will only serve to inconvenience the pilots who abide by the rules; however, anyone intent on “proving a point”, will not give a rat’s a$$ about any stinkin rules; and therein lies the problem.

Let’s hope the government doesn’t go into their “knee-jerk reaction mode” and make hasty legislation that wouldn’t make sense. That process only adds fuel to the non-flying public perception that small airplanes are dangerous and should be banned.

For those of you who care about our flying freedoms, please keep close watch on AOPA.org to get the latest updates on the situation. Call your Congressman, Senator, or both, and let them know about your concerns about them going on the legislative-restriction bandwagon and make up restrictions that only serve to hurt us. We need to look at issues pertaining to General Aviation with a reasonable thought process.

Geez, it’s hard enough out there jumping through the hoops and hurdles laid out for us to follow.

Okay… that’s my rant for the day.