... the same as it ever was.
The Mod has issued guidance to horse riders re low-flying ac and advised that they should wear hi-viz vests. You can't move round our place for hi-viz vest wearing riders. Oh no, wait a minute...
IMHO, this won't actually affect the price of fish a great deal. Our LF habits won't actually change that much (as has been alluded to, most heli flying is done at or above 100' anyway) and the addition of putting in our route WPs to LFBC is little more than a pain in the backside.
The whole thing smacks of the MoD having to be seen to do something to minimise the risk to riders. The "Hotline" is a classic case of this. Mrs Miggins plans a ride at 1100 and calls the Hotline at 0900 to be told there's nothing to affect in the area. She then goes riding, safe in the knowledge that there's no risk, and lo, she gets frightened fartless by the 4-bag of Chinooks going over the top that booked in at 0930. How do you spell "futile" again? AND, despite checking, a horse is no less frightened by a diverted or (perish the thought) lost ac...
Once the dust has settled, I think we will barely remember how we used to do it. The alarming thing is, however, the intent of it all. Undoubtedly (and of course, sadly) other riders will be thrown by horses spooked by LF ac in the future. What's the next step? I'll let you draw your own conclusions...
Fact: 31 riders have been killed as a direct result of road traffic in the past 4 years... I didn't see a new "car booking procedure" in the Highway Code, or even a "Badly Driven Car" Hotline...
Link:
http://www.horseawareness.co.uk/rdinc.htm