NZ ATPL hours requirements

[h1tman47]

Hello all,

Been going through the NZ CAA rules and I'm having some trouble understanding some of these ATPL hours requirements.If anyone out there could help me clarify what the following rules actually mean,I would be very gratful.Here goes;

1) Part 61.31 (i) says
"A pilot may not credit flight time recorded as pilot-in-command under supervision (PIC/US) towards the flight time experience requirements for
an airline transport pilot licence."
Now is this PIC/US the same as what we log under the Command Practice column in the NZ CAA log book? So does that mean that we can only credit the co-pilot time towards the ATPL requirement?

2) At the same time NZ CAA Advisory Circular 61-7 (Rev 9), Appendix 1 says
(ii) 250 hours in aeroplanes consisting of 150 hours or more as pilot-in-command and additional command practice flight time as required;

NOTE: Command practice is time gained in accordance with rule 61.31(b). No more than 50 percent of the total command practice flight time may be used for paragraph ii) mentioned above.
Here its saying that we can use only half of the command practice time towards the PIC requirement.Does that mean we can only count half of the command practice time towards the total 1500 hours like we do with the co-pilot hours?

3) Part 61.31 (b) says that one of the requirements for logging command practice is
(6)the pilot-in-command designated to supervise the co-pilot has certified an appropriate entry in the co-pilot's logbook,or a permanent record of the flight has been made by the operator.
Does this mean that (if the Captain hasnt signed the entry) the company has to certify this. When they say permanent record,do we need to have this record on the log book or is just having it in the airline records enough?

The above 3 points have really been confusing me . So if there is anyone out there who can shed some light,I would be very grateful.Keep in mind that I can only log co-pilot and command practice in my current job. Thanks in advance.

Regards,
h1tman47

[27/09]

"A pilot may not credit flight time recorded as pilot-in-command under supervision (PIC/US) towards the flight time experience requirements for
an airline transport pilot licence."

This refers to PICUS time something we don't have in NZ, but a pilot coming from somewhere like OZ may have. Command practice is logged as Command Practice not a as P in C which is referred to here. I think PICUS might be logged as P in C. So PICUS time cannot be used toward to total P in C requirements needed for an ATPL.

(ii) 250 hours in aeroplanes consisting of 150 hours or more as pilot-in-command and additional command practice flight time as required;

NOTE: Command practice is time gained in accordance with rule 61.31(b). No more than 50 percent of the total command practice flight time may be used for paragraph ii) mentioned above.

What is being said here is that you must have at least 150 hours P in C and the remaining hours towards the 250 hour requirement can be made up with command practice time but you cannot use more than 50% of your command practice time to fill the gap. I.E. If you had 170 hours P In C you would need at least 160 hours Command practice to fill the 80 hour gap between 170 hours and 250 hours. However the Command Practice time still counts one for one towards the 1500 hour total requirement.

6)the pilot-in-command designated to supervise the co-pilot has certified an appropriate entry in the co-pilot's logbook,or a permanent record of the flight has been made by the operator.

Either the Captain signs each entry in your logbook or the company has a record of the Command Practice time which I think is supposed to have a record of the Captain OK'ing the Command Practice time. In the case of the company record you do not need to have a copy of this, but you do need to know that they do in fact keep a record.

[mattyj]

who is the person who writes the rules (and the AIP for that matter?)
Have they taken the ICAO english test yet?

There is a link in the rules section on the CAA website where you can download the ATPL issue form with all the boxes to fill out by the instructor doing the checkride..have a look at that..it lists the requirements in plain language on the form!

[Sqwark2000]

From personal experience regarding Command Practice,

My company preferred you to log CP if you were the Flying Pilot. The company SOP's essentially gave all Capt's permission to supervise Command Practice provided both crew were out of the 3 month probationary period after being checked to line in their respective role. It went further to go on to say it should be discussed at the start of the duty and it should be meaningful experience.

Command Practice was recorded on the company trip records and that met the CAA requirements as, it would be possible, but impracticable to get the skippers to sign off each entry.

It was said to me that Command practice time was considered important because it showed (particularly in interviews) that you didn't just sit there as a "co-pilot" doing as you were told, but making the necessary decisions to complete the flight safely (using appropriate CRM of course). I still log CP as an F/O even with my ATPL.

Hope this helps

S2K

[Capitaine72]

First Officers log co-pilot time when crewing an aircraft whose flight manual requires more than one pilot to crew it when they are the support/monitoring pilot, and command practice time when the Captain of the aircraft is approved by the operator to give command practice and the co-pilot is flying pilot and carrying out the duties of P-in-C. The practice of signing the trip record by the captain and is recorded by the operator is a suitable alternative to signing a logbook.

Pilots who fly as support pilots in aircraft approved for single-pilot operation, usually Part 135 aircraft, which do not have a fully functioning co-pilots instrument panel equivalent to the pilots panel are not permitted to log command practice.

To summarise:
To log command practice:

• the co-pilot must be the flying pilot
• the co-pilot must carry out duties of p-in-c
• the aircraft flight manual must require two pilots
• the captain must be authorised to give command practice
• either the logbook or the trip record must have been signed by the captain to record the event.