Came in the thread to mention this. As far as I know, neither the pilot swap nor the youtuber had FAA permission to abandon their planes in flight.
I’m confident Red Bull pilot(s) will face the same results for crashing their plane as Trevor, and the fact they’re backed by a $15 billion company will have no effect on this judgement.
And for the next aviation stunt, pigs will fly.
Jacob posted a new video on Saturday in which he shows himself returning his pilot’s license, shows some of the TV coverage he’s gotten in the last week, saying he didn’t expect to “ruffle so many feathers,” and hawks some really tacky merch to cover his legal fees.
Unsurprisingly, he says nothing specific about the incident, but he thanks his supporters while recognizing that the aviation community is pretty solidly against him. Although at one point he says he may not try to get his license back, as he puts it in the mailbox, he says to it, “See you in 10 months.”
That’s because, according to an email he puts at the end of the video, the FAA, for reasons not disclosed, agreed to “settle” by lowering the revocation period to ten months from one year.
WTF? Why did FAA have to settle? Could it be because their letter attributed a motive to him that they couldn’t possibly prove, e.g., that he did it to get views? (I thought it was odd that they’d make that claim.) Could his lawyer have threatened them with a defamation suit?
Possibly just to get him to waive an appeal which, while the FAA probably wasn’t too worried about the outcome, would have cost time and money. Money and administrative efficiency are powerful motivators to a bureaucracy. It’s one reason the IRS finds it much easier to go after wage-earners and low-level fraudsters than billionaires.
That’s just me hazarding a guess, though.
More likely, I think, that the FAA didn’t settle, and did in fact permanently revoke his license, and he’s just lying about it. Like he’s lied about, oh, everything.
To be clear, from the part of the video (or one of the videos) I did watch, it didn’t sound like he would get the license back in 10 months or in 12, but that 10 months is when he could submit an application for… something. Whether the application would be accepted/granted or not is less clear.
Reminds me of how my undergrad would handle suspensions. It wasn’t “you’re suspended for the spring semester, but we look forward to seeing you back in the fall” but “you’re suspended for the spring semester, at which point we might consider your application for re-admission.”
Unless he faked the e-mail he posted in the last two seconds of the video, the FAA offered him the settlement I described above. The link below is cued to that point in the video, but you need to hit play and then pause immediately.
(If anyone knows of a way to link to a specific frame of a YT video without having to host a screen grab, let me know. The e-mail is at t=07m04s and the video ends at t=07m06s.)
The email in question says “lowering your one-year reapplication period to 10 months” (although, instead of “lowering”, it says “lowing”).
This looks to me like the FAA is saying that they will let him reapply for his license in 10 months, like ASL_v2.0 said. Whether that reapplication will be approved or not… that may be another story!
“Always Wear Your Parachute”, according to his shirt. Uh-huh.
Do small plane pilots typically always wear a parachute?
ETA: Is he even wearing a parachute there at the end?
And like I said, too.
Let’s hope! He has really become a case of backpfeifengesicht. I want to see him smacked down. Hard.
No. Sailplane pilots commonly do. Aerobatic pilots are required to.
Seat belts are apparent, but no parachute harness or container.
The FAA explicitly denied them permission to perform the stunt. They went ahead and did it anyway.
Red Bull gives you wings…& the FAA will revoke your ability to use them.
An air safety executive and a lawyer for the Airplane Owners and Pilots Association discuss the Trevor Jacob and Red Bull cases.
What it looks like (from front view) when wearing a parachute:
Shoulder straps, chest straps, crotch straps.
(Photo by Senegoid ! )
Update for news: Youtuber Jacob Trevor has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for his reckless stunt.
Article doesn’t say sentenced, article says “pleads guilty” to charges which carry a sentence of up to 20 years.
I wouldn’t expect 20 years for the crash stunt, but the confessed attempt to destroy evidence afterwards is much more serious, I think.
Overwhelmingly when you plead guilty you have a plea deal. I would guess they have a deal of something like a few years probation and a large fine.
I think you’re right. I’m glad this clown is facing consequences for his reckless stunt, but there’s nothing to be gained by locking him up. A whopping fine and a couple of years of probation is just, I feel. Would be nice if the FAA permanently yanked his pilot’s license and YouTube demonetized his channel, though.
Dangit. Sorry for the mistype. I’ve done this a few times recently. I need to slow down and think before I write. Thanks!
Not entirely your fault, it was also a pathetically sensationalist deceptive clickbait headline. You see this so frequently from third rate journalists - “faces 20 years in jail” is just complete nonsense, it is technically true only because there is a wide range of possible sentences for acts of a wide range of seriousness that would fall under the category of offense. You could write an equally deceptive headline “may face only slap on the wrist” prior to knowing the actual sentence.