At the end of the day, the responsibility of letting a pilot self fly hire at an establishment comes down to the establishment.
I know some flying schools that will not let you self fly hire a 206 unless you have 20hrs on type, or you get a safety pilot with you. Another school i know where if you arn't current on the type in the preceeding 90 days (i.e 5 circuits) you need rechecking.
Should'nt it be down to the flying schools to self police this issue of, who is safe enough to fly one of their helicopters.
I mean, have a set of criteria that have to met before the hiring pilot is allowed to self fly. e.g like having intensive emergency procedures instruction for the type. Autorotations to the ground, or at the very least to 10ft. ( on that note i understand that there are only certain instructors who are authorised to do a full auto to the ground?)
Would'nt this then safe guard the institution hiring out the helicopter and the pilot. Yes there is obviously a financial issue here, but flying never was cheap, so why compromise on safety for the sake of an hour or so, doing revisional training with an instructor.
As for the guys who own their own, it comes down to their own self judgement, but then most of the people who own their own have low hours and fall into the categories of "unconsciously incompetant, Consciously competant etc" and that can be a dangerous time. Between 400-1000 hours, must be a nightmare for the pilots who know it all, as that is when most accidents happen. (HASEL checks must be a hassel right?)
The whole idea of self regulation is a great one, but where does the buck stop. I think it also comes down to self-pride. (Have i filled in my log book correctly. Do i do a full DI on the helicopter before i fly? Do i know emergency procedures for the type of helicopter flown? When was the last time that i looked through my books that i used for my PPL/CPL exams, etc?
Back to the instructor issue, should instructors have more than 330 under their belt before they can instruct. It is obvious to see that an instructor that has say only 400 hours won't be able to emphasise to the student what an instructor of say 5000 hours will be able to, in the way of safety, drills, good airmanship...etc
MD 900 Explorer