South African Pilot - fraudulent licence

[crewmeal]

After 20 years of flying for SAA he was found to have a fraudulent licence.

SAA fraudulent licence (https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/saa-alleges-licence-fraud-after-probe-into-a340-upse-456255/)

[GordonR_Cape]

Front page news report in SA: https://mg.co.za/article/2019-03-01-00-fake-saa-pilot-flew-under-radar

Quite a complicated story: Not a Walter Mitty, was previously a flight engineer, with valid CPL, then faked his ATPL. This is not legally required to fly as co-pilot, but was was a condition of employment.

Came to light after investigation into an over-speed incident: Incident: SAA A346 over Switzerland on Nov 6th 2018, overspeed, dual ADR failure (http://avherald.com/h?article=4c0504fb&opt=0)

Edit: Also on the BBC website: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-47420515

[B2N2]

Not really fraudulent.
He held a Commercial and apparently never bothered to get his ATP(L).
Trained on the airplane.
Its a paperwork issue not a safety issue.

[Octane]

“We are disappointed that it took this long to identify this vulnerability in our system” Really, are you sure?

"SAA claims the alleged fraud “at no point” posed a safety risk" How would they know?

Astonishing...

[what next]

Its a paperwork issue not a safety issue.

Exactly. No story at all. Perfectly legal. "Unfreezing" his ATPL would only be required once he gets upgraded to captain. If he wasn't offered this opportunity within the 20 years he was flying with that airline he will never get it, so why bother? All he did was "violating" a company internal rule by which he gave them a reason to kick him out. They probably waited patiently since 19 years for that.

[Airbubba]

I've seen a couple of these jokers in the expat world in years past. A former copilot colleague faked a P1 license from the Middle East to get hired as a captain at Korean years ago. He flew left seat on KE A306's and B744's until his contract was no longer renewed.

A Kiwi acquaintance got in touch with me a couple of decades ago to ask about a possible bogus type rating on an FAA license used to obtain an ATPL for an African airline. I found a phone number for him to call, it turns out that the FAA ATP was real but the type rating was indeed phony.

These days you can easily check an FAA license online:

https://amsrvs.registry.faa.gov/airmeninquiry/main.aspx

Thomas Salme became a celebrity after he got caught flying for 13 years without a valid license, just another paperwork issue I suppose:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1279083/Fake-Swedish-pilot-Thomas-Salme-flies-Air-One-jets-13-years.html

[springbok449]

Was he actually a Flight Engineer or a Second Officer operating the panel, it was fairly common in SAA that Second Officers operated the panel in lieu of Flight Emgineers on the 747-200, 747-300 and SP prior to becoming First Officers....

[ironbutt57]

Exactly. No story at all. Perfectly legal. "Unfreezing" his ATPL would only be required once he gets upgraded to captain. If he wasn't offered this opportunity within the 20 years he was flying with that airline he will never get it, so why bother? All he did was "violating" a company internal rule by which he gave them a reason to kick him out. They probably waited patiently since 19 years for that.


hmmm...one might think/hope that Civil Aviation would be unhappy about the fellow not having an ATPL...and yes it's fraud if he presented himself as captain knowing full well he legally needed an ATPL and knowing full well he didn't have one

[ironbutt57]

Was he actually a Flight Engineer or a Second Officer operating the panel, it was fairly common in SAA that Second Officers operated the panel in lieu of Flight Emgineers on the 747-200, 747-300 and SP prior to becoming First Officers....

in our system, a "Second Officer" held a pilot's licence as well as a flight engineer licence, and flew the panel, it's where all the pilots joining the airline started until they had the seniority to upgrade to "First Officer", some carriers employed "PFE"s (Professional Flight Engineers), who either held only a Flight Engineer ticket, or at some point were unsuccessful at moving up to the right seat

[frampton]

Was he actually a Flight Engineer or a Second Officer operating the panel, it was fairly common in SAA that Second Officers operated the panel in lieu of Flight Emgineers on the 747-200, 747-300 and SP prior to becoming First Officers....
When I left SAA as a flight engineer in 1986, all flight engineers were recruited from the "hangars and workshops", with the exception of a few ex SAA 707 navigators who were suitably qualified,

Quite a few SAA flight engineers became pilots during and after my tenure. I still keep in contact with some of my former colleagues from SAA so the scenario you mention must have occurred post September 1986 up to 2004 when the 747 Classic was retired from SAA which, according to reports, had 111 flight engineers present at the "farewell" photo session.

[krismiler]

I can't help wondering if the matter would have been dealt with differently if the pilot involved had been "previously disadvantaged".

No publicity, no prosecution and given additional time to obtain the required licence would be more likely.

[fdr]

'Bubba, the sandpit guy was hardly a loner in that regard. Most of them did a pretty good job. The sandpit guy has now hung up his spurs, and that concludes an interesting part of aviation history.

The SA guys did a good job in general. The NZ'er was an astute individual, worked well with the serious Canuck. Both of them were concerned with the veracity of a number of the crew histories. An audit of history was conducted well after your time and mine, by a tall, thin, very serious individual. This guy was the guy who refused to sign off a prince as an A320 captain in the pit, and resigned over the matter, as the company involved got another TRI to sign the prince off. With a grand total command time of 87 hours, (eight followed by a seven, no other numbers, zero etc..) the prince parked the shiny jet into the water with 143 total victims following a fluffed approach and GA and whifferdill-halfroll-backflip-nose plant into the brine. (At least 142 people and their families saw little amusement in the proceedings). So, the tall serious one looked at the histories and found that while most were correct, some were not. The NOTs were from all over the globe. While the % was not too bad, the actual numbers were sobering, you run out of fingers and toes counting. Two oddities stood out though, of guys who were universally considered to be P-51 rated, but investigation showed that was not the case, one was US, and the other was Japanese. Both actually did well for the company, arguably the US guy saved an aircraft, that was and is my view.

The review ended up with some career changes I believe, around 2012-2013 or so.

The NZ'er wasn't much liked in the end by the locals, nor was the Canuck to a great extent, both held a line on standards, think Pohang/MD82.

As an aside, anyone who survived the land of the morning calm should get a campaign medal:
Around '05, a really clean operator on the 300-605R flew the plane on a simple 4 sector day, SEL-CJU-PSN-CJU-SEL... nothing of interest, a nice outing. On Monday morning, going to his office, where he had a fairly important position, he was accosted by one of the chief pilots who advised him that a disciplinary meeting was to be held that morning considering his sacking. Why? for the flight arrival into PSN on the day before. After thinking back, the guy came to me, and asked me to review the flight data. We proceeded to the Safety BU, and I ran through the raw data, which looked nice, and then ran a replay of the QAR data, which looked the same, nice textbook approach. The two of us approached the fleet chief pilot, and showed him the data, he showed us the QAR report that he was accusing the captain of having committed. The data showed it was for the day before, only 24 hours out. There was no apology, or embarrassment, there was a flurry of activity to find out who the pilot was of the approach from the day before. Nothing else was ever said, which is I guess a compliment to the captain in it's own right. The program is diminished by the pathology that has existed, and which removal has proven to be rather difficult.

safe flying.

Walk on Freight; this is the industry that exists as a result of the decisions that the politicians, and economists have taken in your name, perhaps it is what is right.

[arketip]

“We are disappointed that it took this long to identify this vulnerability in our system” Really, are you sure?

"SAA claims the alleged fraud “at no point” posed a safety risk" How would they know?

Astonishing...

You mean that most(or least a good number) copilots in the world and quite a few other pilots are a safety risk?

[parabellum]

Exactly. No story at all. Perfectly legal. "Unfreezing" his ATPL would only be required once he gets upgraded to captain.


No where that I have read said he had passed the written exams for an ATPL, so he was, I think just a basic CPL.

[B2N2]

Let me run something by some of you.
So you get hired on let’s say a 737 with your CPL + exams passed aka “Frozen ATPL”
Lets say you fly for a decent company and it only takes you two years to get to the 1500hrs to “unfreeze” your ATPL.
You think this now has magically made you a much safer/better/superior pilot then you were the week before with “just your CPL”?

Really?!
Its not the paper that makes the pilot.

[iggy]

Really?!Its not the paper that makes the pilot.
It is the adherence to the "papers" that makes a professional pilot. Anyone lying over a license will also lie about something else: flight time ("100 hours more or less doesn't really makes you a better pilot, does it?"), duty time, minumum rest, etc...

[swh]

hmmm...one might think/hope that Civil Aviation would be unhappy about the fellow not having an ATPL...and yes it's fraud if he presented himself as captain knowing full well he legally needed an ATPL and knowing full well he didn't have one

They didn’t present themselves as a Captain, they were an FO.

[Dan_Brown]

Hands up those, if asked to resit the ATPL theory today would pass? I for one wouldn't, so does that make me fraudulent or less safe? If I'm honest I maybe pushed to pass the CPL theory..

[ironbutt57]

They didn’t present themselves as a Captain, they were an FO.
i stand corrected

[iggy]

Hands up those, if asked to resit the ATPL theory today would pass? I for one wouldn't, so does that make me fraudulent or less safe? If I'm honest I maybe pushed to pass the CPL theory..

You are right. Why bother sitting the exam if we all are going to forget everything? Just grab the cap and go to the terminal. :ugh:

[cavortingcheetah]

In another life I do remember someone I know very well meeting three pilots from: (edited to read: somewhere up northwest in Africa, near that bulgy bit) pilots at the CAA at Waterfall. They'd just been issued with full South African ATPLs on the basis of their bulgy bit licences and they were hot footing it to Gatwick to get British validations or licences, whatever they could squeeze out of it, based on the full SAA ATPLs with which they'd been issued. I presume they'd have had the odd law exam to write but it was one heck of a short cut. They guys were very proud of the fact that they'd been able to engineer this and became extremely twitchy when the person I know very well flashed his UK ATPL (the one he slaved for ) and got their names from the entry register.
As for the examines in general? They're forgotten as soon as you've walked out the door, passed the subjects or thrown your notes away. What you need to have in your log book is a minimum number of hours flown solo, on complex aircraft, in winter and/or in what might be called challenging meteorological terrain with no auto pilot and no nanny control state. Let's say 1,000 hours of that and you will be a better and safer pilot if only because you have survived. South African flying is a doddle and I have thousands of hours of it to prove that point. I also have thousands of hours of the other sort to prove that point too.
Toodle pip.

[anxiao]

Cavorting, I agree on this one. One of the smartest pilots I converted onto a 747-400 back in the day had around 5000 hours of single engine Cessna flying North of the Arctic Circle in Canada. Beyond the checklists I had nothing to teach him.

I believe he made Captain on the Boeing some 12 years later. I would have taken my family on his aircraft anytime.

[lederhosen]

A lot of long haul jobs require an ATPL so the relief pilot can be in command when the captain is in the bunk. He was presumably type rated on his CPL so legal in that sense. But he clearly misrepresented his qualifications and as such has rightly resigned. Quite what loss SAA have incurred by employing him for twenty years and they wish to recover is on the other hand unclear.

[cavortingcheetah]

Back in the glory days, as far as I remember of course, on SAA the Captain was the Captain, wherever he was. The licence system broke down into......

ATPL. No weight restriction.
SCPL. Weight restriction to be PIC.
CPL. Weight restriction to be CPL.

So a SFO would typically have an SCPL, a boy pilot a CPL and the Captain an ATPL.
Boy pilots were used to carry crew bags and were jolly handy to take messages back to pretty passengers and suchlike sundry items.

[parabellum]

Its not the paper that makes the pilot

BN2 - Once a person has passed the written exams for the ATPL it tells anyone who needs to know that the person has raised themselves to that level, whether they maintain it later is a different matter.

[nugpot]

The way I understand it:

He was never a flight engineer, but worked at SAA Ops as a dispatcher until he had a CPL when he joined SAA as a pilot.
SAA has a condition of employment that all pilots have to have an ATPL within 5 years after starting or be dismissed.
The SA-CAA still uses an almost illegible and obsolete paper license system where you get new "pages" for your license booklet at each renewal.
These plastic booklets with transparent sleeves come in different colours (blue for a CPL and green for an ATPL)
There are only three places/lines in this booklet of pages where the words Airline Transport Pilot/Commercial Pilot or ATPL/CPL appear. The rest of the license is identical.
When the 5 years were coming up, the pilot had still not acquired his ATPL, so he apparently found a green booklet and doctored his valid CPL into an ATPL. I don't know if he ever passed the exams, but he certainly never held the license.
For the next 20 years, he annually went through the same process of document fraud, while maintaining full airline currency as per SAA's training programme.
He refused upgrade when it was due. He continued to refuse the upgrade for at least the last 10 years.
SAA is probably correct when they say that safety was not compromised. By all accounts he was a model FO and operated well.
Document fraud is a crime and it is conceivable that there will be criminal charges.
I think almost all the SA airlines are/were vulnerable to this type of fraud due to the CAA's obsolete licensing system. I assume they are all now doing a thorough license audit.
His ALPA membership was immediately terminated and his actions have been condemned by his peers, colleagues and employer.

[Raffles S.A.]

Yessir, pretty easy to doctor a S.A. license.

[Callsign Kilo]

It is fraud. The guy has presented himself as something he wasn’t in order to fulfill a company requirement; he never ‘legally’ fulfilled it. He did however claim remuneration for such a role, even though he wasnt technically qualified, on paper. He may have been a fine pilot and one more capable than equivalent SFOs in SAA, who knows? Do you think anyone cares either? Too late for that by the looks of it

[pineteam]

Hands up those, if asked to resit the ATPL theory today would pass? I for one wouldn't, so does that make me fraudulent or less safe? If I'm honest I maybe pushed to pass the CPL theory..

Or how many pilots especially in the EASA world hold an ATPL license by studying the data base and barely opening a book? LOL.