Flight plans are very specific outlines of the course, speed, altitude, and chronology of a flight, plus stuff like the pilot's name, the amount of fuel on the aircraft, and what used to be my favorite, "souls on board." (I always wondered, should I put "three souls but the pilot's an atheist"?) More's the pity, it has recently been changed to "number aboard."

There are two kinds of flight plans: IFR (instrument flight rules, for flying under the obsessive radar direction of air traffic controllers) and VFR (visual flight rules, for when the weather is good and you can buzz around pretty much anywhere you want). The two types of flight plans actually differ only slightly. But IFR flight plans are absolutely required, otherwise air traffic control has no idea where you're going or how to deal with you, while VFR flight plans are entirely optional.

So optional, in fact, that they're the equivalent of parallel-parking practice: Only student pilots file them, because they're required to do so as part of their painfully basic learning experience.

The media seem to think that if you "file a flight plan" and then fail to show up at your destination, legions of search-and-rescue people instantly leap into action, retrace your course, and pluck you from disaster. Nah. Five days later, some FAA guy might notice that there's an unresolved flight plan from somebody named Fossett that never got "closed" -- canceled after the pilot landed safely -- and he'd assume that it was one of the many filed and forgotten by careless pilots. 

There's another rationale that all the blow-drys beat to death: If Fossett had "filed a flight plan," we'd know exactly where to search for him.

Fact is, Fossett had only a general idea of where he'd be flying. His next world-record adventure was to be an attempt to set a land speed record of 800 mph, and his Decathlon flight was an aerial search with a slow, maneuverable little airplane for sites -- long, flat, dry Nevada lakebeds -- where he might make the attempt. There is no space on a flight-plan form for that route description: "I'm gonna be going here and there, looking for dry lakebeds, not sure where, but I should be back after a while . . ."

So give the guy a break. Failing to file a VFR flight plan is tantamount to failing to change the air in your tires before going for a drive.

Survival tactic: If, like Steve Fossett, you ever need to be spotted from the air, build a large, perfect triangle from stones, branches, rubble, whatever is available. Straight lines don't exist in nature, and yours will stick out like . . . well, like straight lines, as being man-made.