When is an instructor being chartered ?

['I' in the sky]

Twice in recent weeks I have been asked by students about the possibility of hiring an aeroplane to take them somewhere. The first one would as far I am aware, have definitely amounted to a dodgy charter. The second one I'm not too sure about.

Having just knotted my head round the ANO, cf Article 130 I haven't found the bit that exempts instuctional flights within the auspices of a club from the requiremnts of holding an AOC.

Can anyone point me to the definitive on what reasonably comes within instruction, and where you start to bend it too far ?

PS. I have no desire to bend it at all, I want to get rid of the pressure.

[DB6]

If the airfields in question are licensed, and they are your students, then the flights are quite legitimately navigational exercises (make sure the student plans them etc.). If the airfields aren't licensed then you can't. And if anyone's in the back you can't either.

[This message has been edited by DB6 (edited 19 March 2001).]

[Luftwaffle]

When I worked at a place where some aircraft were on the charter licence and some weren't, the rule was that if the customer came back to the base airport together with the instructor then it was instruction/sightseeing, but if the instructor dropped them off somewhere and left, it was charter, regardless of who was at the controls.

"Can I hire you to take me over to XXX for a couple of hours?"

"We're not licenced for passenger transportation, only local sightseeing. I could take you on a sightseeing flight and we could stop over in XXX for a couple hours for lunch and for you to look around."

Here, an instructor and student can do a multi-day cross country together, or an aircraft owner can hire an instructor to fly with him or her on a trip, as an extra pilot, without anyone needing a charter licence.

Check your air regulations for the difference between passenger transportation and aerial work, or similar terms.

[Noggin]

Article 130 defines Public Transport and Aerial Work. If a flight is remunerated but does not meet the Public Transport criteria then it is Aerial Work.

Article 29 permits a qualified person to instruct (the licence privileges Schedule 8 will dictate if the holder can be remunerated)

By deduction, if a flight is not public transport but the flight is remunerated, then it must be aerial work and no AOC is required.

Art 101 then lays down the requirement to conduct flying training from a licenced aerodrome.

Assuming that all you do is give instruction, there is no further limitation on where you go so long as the airfield is licenced. There is nothing to say that the student cannot get out at a mid point however, who pays for the return flight? If payment were made then the flight would ammount to public transport for the first leg.

The carriage of persons in the back is not illegal so long as there is no payment for the purpose of the flight. i.e. the only payment is by the student for aircraft hire and instruction. Such a person could get out at a mid point without affecting the status of a flight.

The question is then what is Instruction? Clearly, if the "student" is in the process of qualifying for a licence or rating it would be reasonably easy to authenticate. If there was no tenuous connection, it might be more difficult to establish.

[Solent 01]

DB6......

I think you will find that a person can sit in on a friends lesson (take the back seat), as long as the lesson is paid for only by the student.... i.e. no cost sharing. And a lesson is "From - To" any lisensed airfield (within reason, Gatwick to Heathrow dosn't work), and providing you have on board a student !! It is possible for a student at Blackbushe who wanted to get to Bristol to visit family etc. to hire his instructor for a lesson which ends at Filton, where he is left and the instructor returns on his own, this is very legal!!!!

[Charlie Foxtrot India]

Imagine a scenario where you have to explain to grieving rellies and aircraft insurance companies why they shouldn't sue you if it all goes wrong.

I seem to recall over there if you were operating thropugh a club, and all the pax were members then it was all OK? Where I worked we had a handy little "day membership" which cost a quid, and all bums on seats were fully covered by the insurance.

['I' in the sky]

Thanks fellas. That's sort of settled it and it's pretty much as I thought.

Next question though. I was once told that even though instructing is Aerial work, all flight school/club aircraft had to have a public transport C of A. Is this bit correct, and if so why ?

[Noggin]

The customer hires the aircraft from a school for instruction or for private hire. In order to hire an aeroplane it must be in the Public Transport category for airworthiness purposes. The flight may be aerial work or a private flight for Flight Crew licensing purposes.

That is why you cant hire a private cat or permit aircraft.

['I' in the sky]

Thanks.