Unlicensed Airfield
 

'Scuse my foray into this unfamiliar forum, but just got back from pub with this question and knew you'd know this!
Are there any rules to prevent instrument training hours being counted towards a licence, if the flight has taken off from and landed from an unlicensed aerodrome? If not, why is this OK, but not PPL training?
Eg: aircraft takes off from unlicensed aerodrome, flies to airport with IAPs, does some of these IAPs without landing, returns to unlicensed aerodrome as first point of landing.

Microlight, SLMG and IMC rating training have been granted exceptions to the general rule requiring training to be conducted from licensed or government aerodromes.

If you mean 'IR training', that has to be conducted by a FTO. FTOs do not operate from unlicensed aerodromes.

Thanks for the reply Beagle. It throws up another question to me then.
Can an instructor, based normally at a (licensed airfield) FTO, operate such IR training when operating remotely from an unlicensed airfield as outlined in my original example?

Or just to make life more complex, what about from a licenced airfield outside the hours of its licence?

For example, Cumbernauld is open from 9am until 8pm in summer, but only licenced until 5pm.

Very best wishes

The requirement for a licensed aerodrome relates only to training and testing for a licence or aircraft rating. Most FTOs are enganged in such training and so are normally located on licensed sites. However, there is no reason that an FTO should not operate from an unlicensed site so long as it restricted its training from that site to, for example, IR and FI courses.

ISTR that there was a helicopter FTO located at an unlicensed site adjacent to Manston some years ago.