Impersonating a Pilot ?

[VH-XXX]

Happened to stumble across this in a costume shop recently.

Owner told me that they had been told by the Police that they were not allowed to hire out current issue (ie. modern) Pilot uniforms as it was illegal for anyone to dress as a pilot (who isn't one).

Obviously this sounded crazy at first, but I did wonder if there is any basis for this under any regulation?

I suggested that maybe a Police uniform may be stretching the boundaries, but not a Pilots uniform.


On that note, if anyone has any old pilot uniforms they don't want or hostie outfits, costume shops will buy them off you as they often have people wanting them for corporate gigs etc. They charge roughly $20 for a hire so they will pay good money for used quality outfits.

[Horatio Leafblower]

Some people would suggest I am impersonating a pilot every time I go to work :\

[Capetonian]

There is the potential for a problem with airport security, but in my view if someone could get through by simply wearing a pilot's uniform then the security operators deserve to be hung out to dry.

Years ago when I worked for an airline, one of my jobs was issuance of ID tickets, and a man wearing a pilot's uniform came in asking for a ticket and was referred to me. Naturally I asked him for his airline ID card, this before I even became suspicious, at which he got very belligerent and asked me if I thought he'd be wearing a pilot's uniform if he wasn't one. Instead of getting drawn into an argument, I stood my ground and told him I needed his ID card. He said he'd go back to his hotel and fetch it and I suspected that would be the last we'd see of him.

He came back half an hour later with one of those crappy little business cards you print on a machine at railway stations! It had spelling mistakes such as 'Captian' and it said 'Elal Israeli Airline'. I just laughed him out of the office.

As it happened he was a well known Cape Town con-man, an Israeli who lived off con tricks.

As is often the case, he got his just deserts a few years later when my young female assistant came to work very distressed having had a collision with another vehicle on a roundabout. The other party had been driving a battered old car and there was very little damage to it but he'd been very unpleasant and abusive and when he submitted the quote it was for significant damage to a Mercedes. We went to the police who knew the man .......... it was of course the same chap ....... 'persuaded' him to drop the matter. Sadly he got a couple of bruises in the process of being persuaded!