What are the rules in the UK about overflying built-up areas for fun?

Question

I live in North London. It's not like we don't have a fair amount of noise pollution from the sky, with helicopters, and jets landing at LHR with a stupidly shallow glide path angle.

But in addition, quite often on a Sunday afternoon I hear this buzzing of a small propeller plane. It often seems to circle the area quite a few times before eventually going away. We had one today: I looked at it, and (this time) it was a small plane with two props, one on each wing. I have no idea what type of aircraft it might have been. It was flying low enough for the buzzing to be distinctly intrusive, and therefore affecting potentially tens of thousands of people.

It may not have been a flight simply for fun. I presume there's no way of finding out... but does anyone know what the rules are for just randomly deciding to fly over a built-up area like this for the fun of it?

PS I have friends in Cambridge and you often see small light planes overflying that town. They have a friend who owns a light aircraft, and once or twice my friends have said "oh, yes, that's Jim's plane", and have confirmed he does it for recreation.

Answer 1

Does anyone know what the rules are for just randomly deciding to fly over a built-up area like this for the fun of it?

In UK, the master document for air regulations is The Rules of the Air Regulations (ROTAR). UK being still part of the EU, they refer to a common set of rules at the EU level, the Standardised European Rules of the Air aka SERA (qui sera sera...)

UK ROTAR state a minimum flyover height, one for VFR, one for IFR:

The minimum heights for VFR flights shall be those specified in SERA.5005(f) and minimum levels for IFR flights shall be those specified in SERA.5015(b)

and SERA says:

SERA.5005:

(f) Except when necessary for take-off or landing, or except by permission from the competent authority, a VFR flight shall not be flown:

• (1) over the congested areas of cities, towns or settlements or over an open-air assembly of persons at a height less than 300 m (1 000 ft) above the highest obstacle within a radius of 600 m from the aircraft;

• (2) elsewhere than as specified in (1), at a height less than 150 m (500 ft) above the ground or water, or 150 m (500 ft) above the highest obstacle within a radius of 150 m (500 ft) from the aircraft.

So for VFR: 150 m, but 300 m in populated areas.

SERA.5015:

• (2) elsewhere than as specified in (1), at a level which is at least 300 m (1 000 ft) above the highest obstacle located within 8 km of the estimated position of the aircraft.

And for IFR: 300 m above obstacles.

As you see this is not very high. In addition, as you mentioned, aircraft landing or taking off will indeed fly below these minimums.

Jets landing at LHR with a stupidly shallow glide path angle

Landing cannot be done at high angle, the proper slope is the result of two elements:

• Aircraft cannot afford a high descent speed, since the vertical rate determines how hard the landing gears will touch the runway and whether they will be damaged.

• Aircraft cannot slow down under a given speed without losing their capability to create lift. This minimum speed and the previous maximum vertical speed determine a maximum slope.

This glide slope has been chosen so that it is compatible with all sorts of aircraft approach speeds and vertical rates.

A standardized value of 3° is common. But when the approach area is limited, or when this is desirable to maintain a higher altitude a longer time to reduce noise on the ground, then this angle can be increased to 3.5 or 4.5°, or even 5.5°, this is the case for some approaches at Heathrow as @TomMcW told us.

^Source

Alternatively, some airports have lower angles, down to 2.5°.

Answer 2

There are two types of rules I'm aware of that apply here:

1. Low flying prohibitions. These include the 1,000 feet rule and the land clear rule (a.k.a. the glide clear rule). In a built up area you must be 1,000ft above the highest obstacle and able to glide clear of the built up area in the event of a power-unit (engine) failure. If you have more than one power unit (like the multi-engine you mentioned), then you can continue flying with a single engine failure and I suspect that removes the need for glide clear.
2. Controlled airspace. North London is covered by controlled airspace from the surface up, so even if complying with the rule above you still need permission from air traffic control to fly there. Here's a diagram of the airspace over London, which includes TMZ, CTR, CTA and TMA (all different types of controlled airspace, all requiring permission):

Unless you in an emergency, flying into controlled airspace without permission (clearance) will get you into a world of trouble, anywhere from a stern phone call or retraining to getting your license rescinded depending on location and circumstances.

While most private pilots avoid London, there's nothing to stop you asking for a "zone transit" and if they aren't too busy they might even say yes. Here's a video of a private pilot getting permission to fly right over North London at 2,000ft. Incidentally it's a twin engine like the one you mentioned. He's on his way somewhere and clearly experienced, so more likely to get a clearance.

Without clearance you could possibly still fly over some of North London - down to Finchley or thereabouts. Without a multi-engine aircraft you could argue you're able to glide to Totteridge Common. Here's the edge of the airspace for reference: