Aeronautical Decision-Making for Part 107

Aeronautical decision-making shows up on the Part 107 exam without a corresponding CFR section to memorize, which is exactly why it trips people up. There's no §107.XX to point to; the content comes from established FAA risk-management material, and it's tested by describing a pilot's thinking, not by asking for a definition.

What are the five hazardous attitudes, and how do you counter each?

Five specific thought patterns show up repeatedly in FAA aeronautical decision-making material, each with a named antidote meant to counter it directly:

• Anti-authority ("Don't tell me"): dismissing rules or instructions as unnecessary. Antidote: follow the rules, they're usually right.
• Impulsivity ("Do it quickly"): acting on the first option that comes to mind without considering alternatives. Antidote: not so fast, think first.
• Invulnerability ("It won't happen to me"): believing accidents happen to other people. Antidote: it could happen to me.
• Macho ("I can do it"): taking unnecessary risks to prove capability. Antidote: taking chances is foolish.
• Resignation ("What's the use?"): giving up on influencing an outcome, deferring control to chance or someone else. Antidote: I'm not helpless, I can make a difference.

Why is ADM harder to study than a regulation?

A regulation has a fixed text you can look up. A hazardous-attitude question describes a pilot reasoning through a decision, often plausibly, and asks what's wrong with the thinking. That means recognizing the pattern requires actually understanding what each attitude sounds like from the inside, not memorizing five labels in a list. A pilot thinking "the wind's a little strong but I've flown in worse, I'll be fine" is invulnerability dressed up as confidence, and a candidate who's only memorized the label "invulnerability" without the internal voice attached to it can still miss the question.

Crew Resource Management and situational awareness aren't just manned-aviation concepts

Even a single remote pilot operating without a visual observer is expected to apply Crew Resource Management principles, coordinating effectively with anyone else involved in the operation, and to maintain situational awareness, an ongoing accurate picture of the aircraft, environment, and operation as it's actually unfolding, not as it was at takeoff. Hazard identification and risk assessment tie these together into a practical habit: actively looking for what could go wrong before it does, rather than reacting only once something already has.

What does a risk assessment look like in practice?

The habit is a "what if?" analysis done before flight. List the hazards tied to the aircraft, the crew and the operating area, estimate how likely and how severe each one is, and write down what reduces the risk. A lost control link over people, for example, could come from control-station power loss, flying out of range or signal interference, and could end in a ground impact and an injury.

Then add the parts people skip: an emergency plan for when the event happens (a controlled landing area, a lost-link procedure, crew callouts), explicit limits such as minimum weather, and clear criteria for calling the flight off and who makes that call. The regulation gives this a home in the preflight assessment under 14 CFR §107.49, which covers local weather, airspace and restrictions, people and property on the surface, and other ground hazards.

Judgment problems compound with physical ones, so read physiological effects for remote pilots and alcohol, medical fitness, and emergencies alongside this, and see how candidates lose points on the exam for where Operations questions cost the most.

Full breakdown and scenario drills for this topic are in the handbook.