Originally Posted by kiri klein
I have a New Zealand CAA commercial licence
I'm planning to do an IR under FAA.
I've discovered that I can convert my licence for PPL privelages,which is fine while I do the IR, but ( visas and immigration issues aside ) It must be possible to get FAA commerial pilot privilages ?
Can anyone enlighten me on this?
There are no immigration barriers (other than getting required student visas to complete the training) to completing the training for and acquiring a FAA Commercial Pilot Certificate. The requirements for a Commercial Pilot Certificate in the U.S. can be found here:
http://ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text....1.2.6&idno=14
Note: Your Private Pilot Certificate issued on the basis of a Foreign PPL DOES meet the requirements for a pre-requisite Private Pilot Certificate. Again, if your goal is to gain a FAA Commerical Pilot Certificate with unrestricted Instrument privileges then I recommend getting a Private Pilot Certificate issued on the basis of your foreign license, then take the Instrument - Airplane knowledge test, and then the practical test for Instrument - Airplane and then continue on with training for the Commercial Pilot certificate.
A word of caution and advice to all who are considering using their existing experience / training to count towards the training requirements for U.S. certificates: Ensure that your instructor endorses your logbook in some way to certify that he has given you the training. In the U.S. it is common practice for instructors to sign each training flight. In the U.K., the chief flight instructor would usually certify your training before you applied for the license. It is a requirement in U.S. regulations that your training be endorsed by your instructor before you can use it to show that you have met U.S. training requirements. Of course you can only use training time that was gained from an instructor who is licensed by an ICAO contracting state.
Ray