{"id":13171,"date":"2022-05-13T01:08:10","date_gmt":"2022-05-13T01:08:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/faa-revokes-pilot-licenses-after-midair-plane-swapping-stunt\/"},"modified":"2022-05-13T01:08:10","modified_gmt":"2022-05-13T01:08:10","slug":"faa-revokes-pilot-licenses-after-midair-plane-swapping-stunt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/faa-revokes-pilot-licenses-after-midair-plane-swapping-stunt\/","title":{"rendered":"FAA Revokes Pilot Licenses After Midair Plane-Swapping Stunt"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The Federal Aviation Administration has revoked the licenses of two pilots who attempted to swap planes in midair over the Arizona desert last month, calling their actions in the stunt, in which one plane crashed, &#8220;reckless&#8221; and &#8220;egregious.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In addition to the revocation order, dated Tuesday, the FAA also fined Luke Aikins, whom the agency called the lead pilot, $ 4,932 for abandoning his pilot seat and operating his plane in a &#8220;careless and reckless&#8221; manner, after an investigation announced shortly after the April 24 stunt.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Aikins and Andy Farrington, a fellow sky diver and pilot, planned to send their single-engine Cessna 182 planes into synchronized nosedives at 14,000 feet and then jump out to swap cockpits midair.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But when they attempted the switch as they flew over the desert in Eloy, Ariz., Mr. Farrington couldn&#8217;t enter the plane Mr. Aikins had jumped from, according to an FAA emergency revocation order.  The plane spun out of control and crashed nearby, midway between Phoenix and Tucson.  No spectators were present and no one was injured in the stunt, which was livestreamed by Hulu.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In an Instagram post five days later, Mr. Aikins admitted that he had received an email from the FAA denying a request to exempt him from federal aviation regulations, and he said he would cooperate \u201ctransparently\u201d with regulators.  \u201cI made the personal decision to move forward with plane swap,\u201d he said in the post.  &#8220;I regret not sharing this information with my team and those who supported me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Red Bull, the energy-drink company, called the event &#8220;Plane Swap&#8221; and advertised it as a &#8220;first-of-its-kind jump.&#8221;  A spokesman for Red Bull called the license revocations a matter between the agency and Mr. Aikins and Mr. Farrington, saying the company looked forward to its \u201ccontinued friendship\u201d with the two pilots.  Both pilots are still listed on the website of the Red Bull Air Force, a team specializing in aerial stunts, as members.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Red Bull called the stunt \u201cpartially accomplished\u201d with Mr. Aikins swapping planes and landing safely.  Mr. Farrington couldn&#8217;t enter the other aircraft and parachuted safely to the ground, the company said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Both aircraft needed to slow down so the jumpers could catch up to them, and they needed to remain steady enough for the sky divers to squeeze into a door about the width of a home refrigerator, Red Bull said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Aikins, Mr. Farrington and Hulu did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Thursday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The FAA said in its revocation letters that Mr. Aikins and Mr. Farrington had violated federal aviation regulations requiring pilots to stay in their stations, maintain \u201cvigilance\u201d and not operate planes in a \u201ccareless\u201d or \u201creckless\u201d way.  The pilots have to \u201cimmediately\u201d return their certificates to fly commercial planes, or else pay up to a $ 1,644 fine for each day they keep the licenses in their possession.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Both men will have to relinquish most other FAA certifications they have, including Mr. Aikins&#8217;s license to fly drones and Mr. Farrington&#8217;s license for parachute rigging.  They can appeal the agency&#8217;s decision until next Friday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In Mr. Aikins&#8217;s request to the FAA from earlier this year, he sought an exemption because &#8220;during the swap, both aircraft will be unoccupied.&#8221;  The agency said in a reply dated April 22 and signed by Robert C. Carty, the deputy executive director for flight standards service at the FAA, that granting an exemption &#8220;would not be in the public interest&#8221; and that the agency could not &#8220;find that the proposed operation would not adversely affect safety. &#8220;<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The FAA announced the actions against the two pilots nearly a month after it said it had revoked the pilot&#8217;s license of Trevor Jacob, a daredevil YouTuber, who posted a video of himself last year parachuting out of a plane that he claimed had malfunctioned.  The agency said an investigation found that he had deliberately abandoned the aircraft and allowed it to crash in the Los Padres National Forest in Southern California.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><script async defer src=\"https:\/\/platform.instagram.com\/en_US\/embeds.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Federal Aviation Administration has revoked the licenses of two pilots who attempted to swap planes in midair over the Arizona desert last month, calling their actions in the stunt, in which one plane crashed, &#8220;reckless&#8221; and &#8220;egregious.&#8221; In addition to the revocation order, dated Tuesday, the FAA also fined Luke Aikins, whom the agency &hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"> <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/faa-revokes-pilot-licenses-after-midair-plane-swapping-stunt\/\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">FAA Revokes Pilot Licenses After Midair Plane-Swapping Stunt<\/span> Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13172,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2022\/05\/12\/multimedia\/12xp-planeswap1\/12xp-planeswap1-facebookJumbo.jpg?ssl=1","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2022\/05\/12\/multimedia\/12xp-planeswap1\/12xp-planeswap1-facebookJumbo.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13171"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13171"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13171\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13171"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13171"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13171"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}