The buzz job

The dangerous activity of low flying

Nothing to do with a short haircut, a buzz job is when a pilot needlessly flies an aircraft low to give him/ herself a thrill/give the passengers a thrill or scare/ trying to orbit over a friend’s place or trying to impress someone on the ground – cross out as applicable.

The end result often ends in an accident, typically fatal.

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For as long as aircraft have been flying pilots have engaged in unauthorised low flying, beat-ups and buzz jobs. And in that time many have come to grief when the aircraft has hit powerlines, trees, terrain or even buildings or just stalled at such an altitude that recovery was not possible.

Why do they do it? The big ask.

Is it to impress someone with their flying skills? Filling in time to enjoy the exhilaration of racing past objects on the ground? Maybe they have Walter Mitty delusions of being a fighter pilot? Stupid and yet these events continue as new batches of pilots come up through the ranks, some with the thought that they know better and that ‘it won’t happen to me’.

Sorry, it can and does! Each year there are at least several accidents in this country that can be attributed to low flying and buzz jobs, fixed-wing and helicopters alike.

A few cases come readily to mind.

The Cessna 206 pilot who tried a buzz job and did not bargain on the inertia of the descending aircraft and flew it into the ground. The guy in the Auster who hit powerlines strung between two buildings. The Cessna 172 pilot who did his annual beat-up but went a tad lower and hit powerlines. The unsupervised bored Cessna charter pilot who hit a tree in a beat-up. The Airtourer pilot who stalled his machine trying to orbit a friend’s farm house. The Cessna 172 pilot who tried the same circling technique at low level only to stall and take out the four occupants. The Auster pilot who hit a powerline across a river. The RA aircraft hitting powerlines flying low along the beach. The Piper Arrow pilot whose aircraft hit a powerline strung across a reservoir. The warbird pilot who did a stall turn at low level and flew into the ground. The Cessna 152 pilot who hit powerlines over a dam. The ATSB listing of needless accidents from buzz jobs, beat-ups and low flying must be very long.

And yet some pilots simply do not learn from history.

This writer’s father was a Mosquito pilot flying over Europe in the later stages of WW2. He took part in Ranger Patrols, engaging targets of opportunity. While, like a lot a WW2 pilots, he did not talk much about the war, he did talk a bit about his justified fear of hitting powerlines when down low. He knew then that low flying was a dangerous occupation, even if he was authorised and instructed to do so.

Agricultural pilots know only too well that hitting a powerline canThe end result often ends in an accident, typically fatal. really bust up your day. And often the powerline that the ag pilot hits is one that he or she knows about.

Low flying can be a fatal disease

Flying an aircraft is a tremendous sensation. Free from the ground, seeing things that ground-bound citizens cannot see and the feeling that you can make that aircraft do almost anything including flying low. Maybe you want to show off your skills to someone on the ground or even a passenger.

If you crash that aircraft seldom do you kill someone on the ground, but if you kill or injure a passenger that is something that you will have to live with for the rest of your life, assuming that you have not killed yourself. The expression suicide and manslaughter come to mind even if the Coroner calls it death by misadventure. Then there are the people that you leave behind and for what, a short-lived thrill of the buzz job or wanting to show off down low and stalling the machine at an altitude from which you cannot recover? For anyone contemplating doing a buzz job or a low-level orbit of a house or farm, think twice.

What if it goes wrong? Will you survive? Will the passengers survive? Will you be injured? Will the insurance cover a blatant busting of the regs and common sense? Who will pay for the damage to thesadleraircraft or something on the ground? Insurance loss adjusters are just doing their job when they chase an estate for damages.

No. Sometimes it takes a real pilot to stand back and think about the consequences of their actions if they engage in unauthorised low flying and buzz jobs, thrilling that they may be. A momentary case of throwing caution to the wind can end up haunting you for life, however short or long that may be.

All pilots need to understand that low flying can be a fatal disease. Try to avoid catching it. Height is your friend.