Squawks

How many of you have ever flown with a broken airplane? That of course depends on your kind of operation, are you a part 91 Cessna 172 driver, or do you fly for a 135 on demand charter? 121 Air Carrier? Chances are regardless of your type of day to day operations you have flown broken airplanes.

If you fly under part 91 light general aviation aircraft, you probably use something liken to GOOSE A CAT or other saying to help you remember what REQUIRED equipment you must have on board. PART 91.213 and 91.215 help us with this. Remember though, if something is broken and NOT required, you MUST either remove the inoperative equipment or, placard it INOP; the airplane is NOT legal to fly until that is done.

For those of us who fly 135 or 121 this is a whole different ball of wax. Chances are you deal with an Minimum Equipment List. The first action you must take with a mx discrepancy is to WRITE IT UP. If someone tells you that your nav light is not on and you know that it is, how would you write that up? Nav light inop is the only correct way to write it up, If you state, NAV LIGHT BURNED OUT, now you are diagnosing the problem and that leads down a whole dark path with the FAA.

After you have written up the discrepancy, then chances are your company procedures are to call MX, look in the MEL, etc.. Remember, once you are in flight if something breaks, you are not required to write it up till the end of that LEG. You are considered in flight once you leave the blocks for purposes of flight.. i.e. taxing to the runway the tower calls and says your nav light is not on, you know it is, you may continue the flight and write it up at your destination.

A word to the wise... there are many of us who write things up at home base, or at the end of the day either for our own connivence or to save the company money or both. Please head this warning.. the FAA and local FSDO’s are cracking down on this and making spot inspections specifically for write ups. This may apply more the 135 operators, but either way, if it breaks.. simply write it up and let MX do their job. No one can fault you for that.