FLYING Magazine
Question: I am a new-hire CFI who just started flying at an airport near a Class D facility. The school CFIs teach you should take the long way around the Class D airport when flying in the local area rather than asking for permission to transition the airspace. A few said a previous CFI told them student pilots aren’t allowed to transition to the Class D. I haven’t found any documentation on this. Is there some special rule about student pilots and Class D that I’m just not aware of?
Answer: Without knowing which Class D you are referring to, it is difficult to provide a succinct answer. As described, this sounds like convoluted “tribal knowledge.”
Tower-avoidance behavior is often the result of pilots being trained by a CFI who chose to avoid Class D to avoid the “hassle” of talking to the tower. Or perhaps it was a means of adding time to the flight, as a zigzag route takes longer than a straight line. Most likely it is a combination of the two. It is also quite possible that the CFI was trained by an instructor who avoided talking to towered airports. This tower-avoidance behavior becomes normalized and gets twisted into “we’re not allowed to go there.”
You may want to reach out to the airport manager at the Class D airport and ask if there are special procedures for student pilots because of congestion, airspace boundaries, etc. If they exist, they will likely be published and accessible.
Once you have the answer, teach the learners how to get permission to transition and then demonstrate it during a flight.
A good technique is for the CFI to make the initial call with request to transition, noting the aircraft altitude and location in relation to the airport. If transition is approved, ATC provides an altitude to fly along with the permission to transition, may provide a discreet squawk code, and instructs the pilot to stay over a particular landmark—“stay west of the shoreline”—as reference. The pilot taking instruction observes this process, then on the way back to the home airport they make the request to transition. Like most things aviation related, once the task is demonstrated it loses some of its “fear factor” and becomes easier.
Pilots should always be prepared to take the long way around if the request for transition is denied. Never be “that guy” who enters airspace without permission.
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