Taxiing and Sailing (ASES, AMES)

On the water you often cannot comply the way the rule imagines — the right-of-way rules themselves (general, crossing, head-on, overtaking, and special circumstances) are laid out in full under Task I.I, but applying them means:

• Sailing, you go roughly where the wind takes you. If a give-way obligation and the wind disagree, the answer is a powered taxi or a restart, not a slow drift toward the vessel you owe way to
• Step taxiing, you are fast, nose-high, and partly blind ahead — so the obligation to keep clear has to be discharged early, by route selection, not by a late turn
• Turning downwind in a displacement taxi may be the maneuver you cannot safely make at all in strong wind

Because 91.115(a) makes keeping clear your burden regardless of who is privileged, plan the taxi so that no yield you owe ever depends on a control input the airplane can't make.

Because you are usually the craft whose limitations are least understood by everyone else on the water. A boat operator has no way to know that your engine is at idle, that you weathervane into wind, or that you cannot stop on the step. Since 91.115(e) puts the burden on each craft to proceed with careful regard to those limitations, the professional posture is to build margin you don't need — pass well clear of swimmers, kayaks, moored boats, and wakes rather than measuring the rule.

Idle (displacement), plow, and step taxi — CA.II.E.S7 requires you to steer and maneuver with proper situational awareness and desired orientation, path, and position "using idle, plow, or step taxi technique, as appropriate." The commercial answer lives in the last two words: the technique is chosen for the conditions and the traffic, and the examiner is assessing that judgment more than the stick-and-rudder. High-energy step taxi requires an area you have positively confirmed is clear ahead; congested water, docks, and reduced visibility argue for idle taxi.

As pitch-attitude problems on the step, not as things that happen to you. CA.II.E.S6 requires you to position flight controls, flaps, doors, water rudders, and power correctly for the existing conditions both to follow the desired course while sailing and to prevent or correct for porpoising and skipping during step taxi — prevention is written into the standard first. The correction is re-establishing the correct planing attitude with smooth, positive elevator; if the oscillation is diverging, reduce power and settle off the step rather than chasing it with out-of-phase inputs.

CA.II.E.S4: depart in a safe manner, considering wind, current, traffic, and hazards. Plan the entire sequence before the lines come off, because a seaplane starts drifting the instant it's free — where the wind will take you, where you'll start the engine, the taxi route out, the hazards along it (buoys, swimmers, shallow water, other traffic), and what you do if the engine doesn't start while you're drifting. Wind and current can disagree; a plan built on only one of them is half a plan.

The same structure as a land airport:

• Chart Supplement U.S.: the most comprehensive source for a given airport, covering "airports, heliports, and seaplane bases that are open to the public"; published in seven regional books and revised every 56 days (PHAK ch. 14)
• Airport diagram or taxi chart: required if published (CA.II.E.S2)
• Markings, signals, and signs: compliance required for seaplane base, airport, and taxiway markings (CA.II.E.S3)
• ATC instructions: apply exactly as on pavement when the water landing area sits inside towered airspace, with correct read-back of clearances still required (CA.II.E.S1)

CA.II.E.S10 — you must comply with the applicable taxi elements in Task II.D. That means the full land-taxi standard on top of the water standard: airport diagram in view, taxi clearance read back with call sign, hold-short discipline, brake check as soon as the airplane is in motion, crosswind control positions, and speed controlled by throttle rather than brakes. Add the amphibian's own trap: gear position must be correct and verified for the surface you're operating on, and confirmed again before every transition.

In the same place it bites on pavement — instructions you've heard many times before — but worse, because the "taxiway" has no painted centerline to disagree with your assumption. The AFH's warning is general: a pilot given the same instructions repeatedly starts expecting them and may not realize they no longer apply, and "it only takes missing one instruction or turn to generate an accident" (AFH ch. 2). Read back what was said, and re-verify the water lane and traffic picture visually rather than from memory.

Sterile-cockpit discipline, and checklists completed while stopped wherever that's practical — the FAA's surface-operations guidance is heads-up, eyes outside, entire attention on surface navigation, with no place for non-essential chatter (PHAK ch. 14). Sailing complicates it: the airplane is moving under wind power with the engine at idle or off, so there is no quick way to arrest the drift. Anything that takes your eyes inside has to be finished before the lines come off, not after.

Same rules as pavement, with less around you to see by:

• Anti-collision lights on at all times before engine start; for night operations, position (navigation) lights on as well (AFH ch. 2)
• Turning the rotating beacon ON or flashing the position lights helps alert anyone nearby to stay clear of the propeller — but it does not replace a deliberate scan of the area, which matters more on the water where a swimmer, kayak, or line handler can be alongside and low (AFH ch. 11)
• Position lights are arranged like a boat's: red on the left wingtip, green on the right, white on the tail (AFH ch. 11). That is exactly how a vessel operator will read you, so your lights and the 91.115 right-of-way rules tell the same story — a boat seeing your red light knows it is on your left
• 91.205(c)(3) requires an approved anti-collision light system for night VFR; 91.209(b) lets the PIC turn the anti-collision lights off in the interest of safety (AFH ch. 11) — glare off water, mist, or spray is a legitimate reason
• Add the taxi or landing light once you're ready to taxi, and expect it to backscatter badly in spray or fog

The water surface itself is the primary instrument, backed up by secondary references, with current read separately:

• Surface: wind streaks and ripple patterns run with the wind; calm glassy water hugs the lee shore; wave height builds with fetch toward the downwind shore
• Secondary references: moored boats and birds lie into the wind, and your own airplane weathervanes nose-to-wind at idle — a live indicator at all times
• Current: a separate variable, read separately — drifting debris shows current while surface streaks show wind, so near a dock you have to plan for both at once