Avgas giveaway at fly in

NoHeat

NoHeat

En-Route
Joined
Jul 27, 2009
Messages
4,996
Location
Iowa City, IA
Display Name
Display name:
17
A new experience for me:

As I signed in at a fly in this morning, expecting only to get free pancakes and coffee, I was asked if I wanted to enter a drawing for "free gas."

It turned out the city of was giving away $50 of avgas.

I don't know who won it, but I'm sure they are happy.
 
Those raffles always make me question their legitimacy, if the winner isn't announced during the event.

They'll have the slips of paper to fill out and the box to put them in, but then you'll never hear who won.
Nobody ever hears who won, so did anybody ever in-fact win??

90% of the time I like to believe they're bait and switch tactics.
 
Ryanb said:
Those raffles always make me question their legitimacy, if the winner isn't announced during the event.

They'll have the slips of paper to fill out and the box to put them in, but then you'll never hear who won.
Nobody ever hears who won, so did anybody ever in-fact win??

90% of the time I like to believe they're bait and switch tactics.
Click to expand...

When I was selling race fuel, sometimes I would have a give-a-way based on fuel sales. I would put my copy of the receipt in a box, than at the end of the race I would have a drawing. Usually the give-a-way was 5 gallons of race gas, or 10 gallons of methanol or a 5 gallon fuel jug.

Most of the time I would select one of the lower funded teams and try to help them out a little and "pull" their receipt out of the box.

T-shirts were different. Usually the girls that would make our T-shirts look best would get a free T-shirt.
 
NoHeat said:
A new experience for me:

As I signed in at a fly in this morning, expecting only to get free pancakes and coffee, I was asked if I wanted to enter a drawing for "free gas."

It turned out the city of was giving away $50 of avgas.

I don't know who won it, but I'm sure they are happy.
Click to expand...

But unless you have a commercial ticket, you cannot legally accept the free avgas prize because then you are not paying for your fuel and the FAA considers that compensation in free flight hours.
Tread carefully! :D
 
Those raffles always make me question their legitimacy, if the winner isn't announced during the event.
Click to expand...

This one wasn't a raffle. It was an outright giveaway. Show up with your plane at the airport for the fly-in, and you could enter the drawing.

BigBadLou said:
But unless you have a commercial ticket, you cannot legally accept the free avgas prize because then you are not paying for your fuel and the FAA considers that compensation in free flight hours.
Tread carefully! :D
Click to expand...

I know you said that in jest, but I wonder if there might actually be something to your idea.

If the airport's motivation is to stimulate pilots to fly to their airport for the fly-in, so that the locals gathered there could see your plane arriving and departing, does it amount to compensation for flying, if they give you something of value for doing what they wanted you to do?
 
BigBadLou said:
But unless you have a commercial ticket, you cannot legally accept the free avgas prize because then you are not paying for your fuel and the FAA considers that compensation in free flight hours.
Tread carefully! :D
Click to expand...

You must be fun at parties...
 
BigBadLou said:
But unless you have a commercial ticket, you cannot legally accept the free avgas prize because then you are not paying for your fuel and the FAA considers that compensation in free flight hours.
Tread carefully! :D
Click to expand...
Not true. The FAA generally does not consider a prize associated with an event to be compensation, particularly a prize that is of de minimus value and and is not expected by the participant. The FAA addressed this 25 years ago in the context of balloon events. No one is going to get hit with a 61.113 violation for accepting a $50 fuel gift card from a random drawing.
 
Brad Z said:
Not true. The FAA generally does not consider a prize associated with an event to be compensation, particularly a prize that is of de minimus value and and is not expected by the participant. The FAA addressed this 25 years ago in the context of balloon events. No one is going to get hit with a 61.113 violation for accepting a $50 fuel gift card from a random drawing.
Click to expand...

Oh, I'm glad to learn that!

Unfortunately I was not the winner of the free avgas, but I'm sure somebody out there will be relieved to learn they can, in good conscience, enjoy the gas that came with their breakfast at that fly in.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top