Peter Duniho" wrote:
The form should be filed regardless of whether you think you need
the enforcement protection. Your first thought should be regarding
whether the form can help others learn from your mistakes (or the
mistakes of others).

"Nasir" wrote:
I was not sure how harmless or harmful this mistake was and whether it may
be too trivial for the NASA form? For what its worth, I was VERY careful
before I started to taxi and made sure no other aircraft was on the taxiway
(pretty slow day at the airport). Something I learned diligently at the
uncontrolled field.

I agree with Peter; there is value in filing the form in helping to
improve overall system safety. Let's look at your incident.

The basic problem sounds like you did your training at an uncontrolled
field and weren't that familiar with controlled airport operations.
When you got to an airport which had a published tower frequency but no
ground frequency (a situation I've never actually seen myself; are you
sure about this?) you incorrectly assumed this meant you didn't need to
talk to anybody to taxi to the runway.

OK, that's fine. You made a mistake (and learned from it), but lots of
pilots (especially new ones) make mistakes. No training program is 100%
effective. But, maybe the mistake you made is a common one? If
everybody who made that mistake sent in a NASA form, somebody who reads
the forms might notice a pattern, and NASA might make a recommendation
to the FAA that student pilots training at uncontrolled airports get
better training in ATC ground operations. Eventually that
recommendation will filter down to CFIs like me and we'll change the way
we teach.

Well, at least that's the plan. Whether it really works that way is a
matter of conjecture :-)