Are there countries with age limits for private pilots?
Some sensible observations and advice from across the pond
https://www.avweb.com/news/features/Pilot-AgeJust-A-Number-231912-1.html
Mooney_Driver wrote:
Well, apparently that was not a stroke after all but some sort of intoxication. Otherwise the lady in question would not have been dismissed (or forced to resign) very shortly after the event.
That’s pure speculation. I suggest we refrain from that until the official FAA investigation is concluded.
It also brings us back to the age old question of when uninvolved third parties (FBO, ATC etc) should become involved and just tell the guy that he’s not OK.
Is there a liability on ATC if they question a pilot?
In other areas there can be e.g. if a doctor tells a patient that his health issues are primarily caused by him weighing 150kg, the doctor is liable to spending some time filling in forms, following a complaint of “fat shaming” etc. But surely ATC don’t have a problem like that? In the UK at least, there have been many cases of FISOs and A/G guys (none of whom can control traffic in the air) ordering people to do such and such, in the air, with no comeback.
We have a number of ATCOs here who must know the rules on this sort of thing.
I think the bigger issue in this case is that FAA is quite properly tasked with helping pilots, not questioning them, unless there were evidence that they are not legally qualified to conduct the flight. There is more to be gained by limiting ATC authority in this regard than by empowering them to be petty detectives… assuming they in their Hawaiian shirt splendor (I know a couple 
) could be bothered, which as good Federal employees aiming to stay out of trouble they can’t and won’t regardless.
ATC is basically blue collar work conducted within a tightly defined and monitored job description. The people recruited and trained self select to that kind of work and operate by that model. Best to keep them in their box.
Silvaire wrote:
FAA is quite properly tasked with helping pilots
I think that it’s fair to say that this gentleman, and his family and friends, would have been helped by intervention.
There is more to be gained by limiting ATC authority, unless you want the level of unqualified petty dictatorships that run rampant in (for example) the UK.
I think that “run rampant” is a bit strong. There are one or two, we all know who they are (though they do vary with who is on duty, and when they retire), but the vast majority operate “to book” and are fine.
I think that a bigger problem in the UK is lack of pilot understanding of what service they should expect, exacerbated by our rather silly non-standard services.
I don’t think I’ve ever run into a UK ATCO who qualifies as running a “petty dictatorship”. I’ve always felt that ATC is part of the team (we have after all the same goal – to get from one end of the airspace to the other without banging into anything else or the terrain). I have not found ATC in the UK any different in that respect from ATC in the USA (where I have about 1000 hours operating in and around class B airspace).
There’s a lot of undue “fear” or misunderstanding of what ATC does here and it gets repeated often on forums.
I suggest that Silvaire was referring to a very few Radio operators and even fewer FISOs who have a reputation for overstepping the mark and barking out orders which they are not entitled to give.
But if he thinks that that is widespread, I think that he cannot have had broad experience in the last few years. If he is basing his judgment on operating out of one particular NW London airfield ten years ago, then, fair enough.
