You say:
"One very approved chappie in that area who has suddenly lost his log books cannot remember when or where or with whom he did his instructor rating, believe it or not"
Well, it seems his story keeps changing - assuming we are talking about the same fella. He said he lost his log books when the Rabaul volcano erupted, and buried/burned the helicopter/building in which they were stored. The logbooks contained all his ratings, including an instructor rating done with an old man in a different country who had subsequently died and all his records disposed of.
He convinced CASA that this was true, but they still demanded he do some instructor training and a rating test. He did this training in Sydney, and confidentiality prevents me from saying much more, but he did pass the test. Probably the only person to pick up an instructor qualification with 10 hours course duration.
So now, it is a genuine CASA instructor rating. Not sure about the 18,000 hours of accident-free flying, he probably didn't count the three or four minutes of accident-FILLED flying.
