Originally Posted by
Mach Tuck
Well he’s alleged to have undertaken a revenue flight without a commercial endorsement, a night flight without a night endorsement and an instrument flight without an instrument endorsement so is there any reason to assume he had a complex endorsement? It has also been alleged that he is a very experienced pilot so why wouldn’t someone give him the keys to the Malibu?
There seems to be some confusion about the meaning of "endorsement". In FAA parlance, a pilot may hold a license with commercial privileges and that license may including an "instrument airplane" rating. The terms "commercial endorsement" and "instrument endorsement" have, to the best of my knowledge, no meaning in the context of an FAA issued pilot license. "Night endorsement" does have meaning and is applicable to a student pilot who has been authorized for solo night flight.
A pilot who has received training for complex (as defined by FAA) aircraft earns no additional rating and there is no change to the pilot's license. The training, and approval, is documented in the pilot's log book by the instructor who gave the training. The log entry is an "endorsement".