Limitations of Discovery Flight?

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J. Taylor Stanley

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Taylor Stanley
I have looked in the FAR and online and can't seem to find and FAA definition/restrictions of introduction/discovery flights. A few things come to mind. I have heard that a person can only have one in their life, that way you get a once time pass to skirt the 135/common carriage issues. Also, if you are a CFI operating under basic med or 3rd class, can you do an introductory flight if it isn't technically an instruction flight? I have a CFI ride coming up and this just popped into my head and I can't seem to find any answers.
 
I think a Discovery flight might be considered sightseeing. I know I had many intro or discovery flights before I started lessons for real.
 
I dunno for sure, but I’ve had more than one discovery flight, so I don’t think that’s an issue. The whole ‘common carriage’ and ‘holding out’ stuff is really a load of crock imho and shouldn’t apply to us little guys, but that’s a different story.
 
J. Taylor Stanley said:
I have looked in the FAR and online and can't seem to find and FAA definition/restrictions of introduction/discovery flights. A few things come to mind. I have heard that a person can only have one in their life, that way you get a once time pass to skirt the 135/common carriage issues. Also, if you are a CFI operating under basic med or 3rd class, can you do an introductory flight if it isn't technically an instruction flight? I have a CFI ride coming up and this just popped into my head and I can't seem to find any answers.
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Can you show me the FAR on that?

Why folks read things into regs and laws that aren’t there is puzzling.

Call it a into flight, first lesson, whatever, it’s simply a into training flight with a CFI, that’s it, a CFI doesn’t need a 2 or 1 medical as he’s making his $$ off his CFI not his CPL/ATP.


“
§1552.1 Scope and definitions.

Flight training means instruction received from a flight school in an aircraft or aircraft simulator. Flight training does not include recurrent training, ground training, a demonstration flight for marketing purposes, or any military training provided by the Department of Defense, the U.S. Coast Guard, or an entity under contract with the Department of Defense or U.S. Coast Guard.”

Medical
https://www.faa.gov/about/office_or...95/fretwell - (1995) legal interpretation.pdf
 
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murphey said:
I think a Discovery flight might be considered sightseeing. I know I had many intro or discovery flights before I started lessons for real.
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That opens a whole other can of worms. Sightseeing tours must be within 25 miles of the airport, which isn't that much of a problem. The issue is that it requires a letter of authorization from the FSDO. I don't know any flights schools I have been to that have them. If you do consider it a flight lesson, how do you deal with the TSA issues of checking new students? Also, like I was saying earlier, if you are a CFI operating under a 3rd class or BasicMed, you aren't legal to give sight seeing tours, so if that is what the flight falls under, can you not give them?
 
James331 said:
Can you show me the FAR on that?

Why folks read things into regs and laws that aren’t there is puzzling.

Call it a into flight, first lesson, whatever, it’s simply a into training flight with a CFI, that’s it, a CFI doesn’t need a 2 or 1 medical as he’s making his $$ off his CFI not his CPL/ATP.
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I've never seen a intro flight get all the TSA info needed to check citizenship to give flight instruction. You can't legally give instruction without seeing all that, keeping a copy and writing the endorsement. People just show up, shake hands and go take the flight...It has to be legal, but under the rules of sightseeing or instruction, I don't see how.
 
Discovery flight is a marketing name given to a first flight lesson. TSA says discovery flights are "demonstration flights for marketing purposes" and exempt from verification of citizenship. The FAA doesn't make a distinction between a discovery flight and any other kind of flight training.
 
J. Taylor Stanley said:
I've never seen a intro flight get all the TSA info needed to check citizenship to give flight instruction. You can't legally give instruction without seeing all that, keeping a copy and writing the endorsement. People just show up, shake hands and go take the flight...It has to be legal, but under the rules of sightseeing or instruction, I don't see how.
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It’s not a sight seeing flight, it’s a demonstration flight in a training aircraft with a CFI for a prospective student, as I cited above it does not require a TSA nonsense endorsement nor a 2 or 1 medical.
 
J. Taylor Stanley said:
I've never seen a intro flight get all the TSA info needed to check citizenship to give flight instruction. You can't legally give instruction without seeing all that, keeping a copy and writing the endorsement. People just show up, shake hands and go take the flight...It has to be legal, but under the rules of sightseeing or instruction, I don't see how.
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TSA has exempted introductory, discovery or demonstration flights from the requirements of the TSA rule.
 
James331 said:
It’s not a sight seeing flight, it’s a demonstration flight in a training aircraft with a CFI for a prospective student, as I cited above it does not require a TSA nonsense endorsement nor a 2 or 1 medical.
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Cool. That is what I am looking for. Do you happen to have a link or something that I can reference? I cannot find anything official.
 
James331 said:
It’s not a sight seeing flight, it’s a demonstration flight in a training aircraft with a CFI for a prospective student, as I cited above it does not require a TSA nonsense endorsement nor a 2 or 1 medical.
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I would say more than 95% of discovery flights at my airport are people that find the groupon and go for a flight with the intention on never taking lessons. And on top of that most of the discovery flights are a complete ripoff. Sold as 1 hour experience which is 30 minutes ground, and then flight. Which usually equates to a 15 minute flight. Then the schools have a fuel surcharge of $100, a BS paper logbook for another few bucks. And then they don’t allow the client to take pictures, only the school will do and charge more money.

So what gets sold is 15 minutes of flying for around $300 after the complete screw job given to some poor fool that just wanted to go for a plane ride.
 
TommyG said:
I would say more than 95% of discovery flights at my airport are people that find the groupon and go for a flight with the intention on never taking lessons. And on top of that most of the discovery flights are a complete ripoff. Sold as 1 hour experience which is 30 minutes ground, and then flight. Which usually equates to a 15 minute flight. Then the schools have a fuel surcharge of $100, a BS paper logbook for another few bucks. And then they don’t allow the client to take pictures, only the school will do and charge more money.

So what gets sold is 15 minutes of flying for around $300 after the complete screw job given to some poor fool that just wanted to go for a plane ride.
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I used to love me some disco flight $$

Those are awesome $$! Used to get $100 (often cash) for a .5 in a 2 seater.
That said those you did go on with training had a pretty damn low rate for what they got.
 
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TommyG said:
I would say more than 95% of discovery flights at my airport are people that find the groupon and go for a flight with the intention on never taking lessons. And on top of that most of the discovery flights are a complete ripoff. Sold as 1 hour experience which is 30 minutes ground, and then flight. Which usually equates to a 15 minute flight. Then the schools have a fuel surcharge of $100, a BS paper logbook for another few bucks. And then they don’t allow the client to take pictures, only the school will do and charge more money.

So what gets sold is 15 minutes of flying for around $300 after the complete screw job given to some poor fool that just wanted to go for a plane ride.
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The good news is that atleast the guy is getting introduced early to the perpetual screw job if he does start flying.
 
TommyG said:
I would say more than 95% of discovery flights at my airport are people that find the groupon and go for a flight with the intention on never taking lessons. And on top of that most of the discovery flights are a complete ripoff. Sold as 1 hour experience which is 30 minutes ground, and then flight. Which usually equates to a 15 minute flight. Then the schools have a fuel surcharge of $100, a BS paper logbook for another few bucks. And then they don’t allow the client to take pictures, only the school will do and charge more money.

So what gets sold is 15 minutes of flying for around $300 after the complete screw job given to some poor fool that just wanted to go for a plane ride.
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That would be highly unusual, is your airport LAX?
 
I have an idea. Why don't we all send a letter to the FAA asking them whether discovery flights are ok and let's see how many different answers we get back.
 
PPC1052 said:
I have an idea. Why don't we all send a letter to the FAA asking them whether discovery flights are ok and let's see how many different answers we get back.
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You wouldn't get an answer, because the term "discovery flight" doesn't exist anywhere in Title 14. You're either providing flight instruction, or you're not.
 
TommyG said:
And on top of that most of the discovery flights are a complete ripoff. Sold as 1 hour experience which is 30 minutes ground, and then flight. Which usually equates to a 15 minute flight. Then the schools have a fuel surcharge of $100, a BS paper logbook for another few bucks. And then they don’t allow the client to take pictures, only the school will do and charge more money.
So what gets sold is 15 minutes of flying for around $300 after the complete screw job given to some poor fool that just wanted to go for a plane ride.
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Your airport (or FBO specifically) is the real problem. They’re not all that way.
 
425,678. That's the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.
 
EdFred said:
425,678. That's the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.
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Nah....measure the head of the pin. The measure and determine the average width of an angel’s rear end. Simple divisionat this point.
 
Now, to make life even interesting....those volunteer flights by Challenge Air and Young Eagles.
 
Brad Z said:
You wouldn't get an answer, because the term "discovery flight" doesn't exist anywhere in Title 14. You're either providing flight instruction, or you're not.
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They’d point to the letter I linked to and the CFR I mentioned.

Discovery flight = demo flight
 
murphey said:
Now, to make life even interesting....those volunteer flights by Challenge Air and Young Eagles.
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Those are actually defined in the regs and allowed. Many orgs miss the requirement to notify the FSDO and the minimum pilot hour requirements, however. But charity flying is well defined.

Many orgs have carve outs and special rules for their stuff just by asking, also... the bigger ones. Young Eagles, most of the humanitarian medical flying groups, and CAP, all have specific carve outs, last I checked.
 
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