It’s not possible to safeguard from an air attack and allow “free” private GA at the same time. The reason GA is permitted in Europe, the US, etc, is because there are no borders with countries which are (a) openly hostile and (b) have a lot of capability.
According to the local pilot I met there, the problem is the military because of the dormant conflict. That means that the whole South Korean airspace is controlled by the military ad they don’t like GA, not sure why exactly, but they seam to consider all GA suspicious.
That’s interesting. Again, I know nothing about GA in South Korea, but this country being quite wealthy and democratic, I would have thought there is a lot more private GA than that.
It is not completely prohibited,no. In principle, it is possible, however, difficult to find an airplane to rent and if you find one, it is difficult to get a flight plan accepted. Any cross country flight requires a flight plan at least 24h prior, which is checked by the military.
I’ve met a private pilot in Seoul last year and he took me to the Korean flying university where he knew one of the ‘professor’ which allows him to fly there (normally only for the students). I ended up taking a local flight with the said professor as my instructor, which was quite a nice experience. Being around the airport in short and tee-shirt with all the student in black trousers and white shirt was also quite ‘funny’ :-).
Going back there soon, will see if I manage to get some flying adventure again.
HBadger wrote:
Plane was a GIS company’s plane so probably commercial pilots.
AFAIU private flying is prohibited in South Korea so it must have been commercial – or training.
Both of my bird strike stories have been added to the appropriate thread.
I think the controllers were American because they contacted US airbases.
Plane was a GIS company’s plane so probably commercial pilots.
They were down to 20 mins fuel, don’t think they lied about that. So probably didn’t matter to them if the airfield has avgas or not.
If the controller wouldn’t have asked for fuel remaining in minutes, I think the pilots would have wasted many more valuable minutes. It’s a Korean thing… losing face, trying to be polite, and respecting authority. They had some famous accidents because of that.
Peter wrote:
I wonder why ATC told him to remain at the end of the runway, thus blocking the runway?
They will need to send those fire trucks somewhere no?
It does not hurt for the PIC to call for them while you are in the air (tough it does sound scary for pax on a GA aircraft, so a wise use of words is not a bad idea “we need assistance, probably landing long, can you send someone”….)
Ibra wrote:
I had a friend who was diverting due to “doubts on weather ahead” but he was asked for ppr on RT by an AG (or no landing)
Sigh. Ridiculous PPR rules strike again. I’m sure this kind of thing has been a factor in fatal accidents.
