Inaccurate logbook entries
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Inaccurate logbook entries
My apologies if I am asking questions that have been covered elsewhere – when searching the forums I found this thread http://www.pprune.org/dg-p-general-a...k-forgery.html , but I was looking for more specific information that did not seem to be answered there, and am hoping more clever and wiser minds than mine can answer some questions.
My questions are about log book fraud/ false entries/’massaging’ of flight time in Australia.
I have been told that some slight adjustment of figures is common, especially amongst low hour pilots (e.g. adding an additional 0.1 to some flights).
Is this actually common practice?
If so, at what point do you ppruners think this becomes excessive/fraudulent?( Is 0.1 on some flights allowable? Is 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, or 0.4 too much for a flight? Is any ‘adjustment’ just plain fraudulent?)
According to the CASA website : Civil Aviation Safety Authority - Pilot Log Books , falsification of flight time is a criminal offence. CAR 5.51 has a note saying “Note It is an offence against regulation 283 for a person to make a false or misleading statement in his or her personal log book , but CAR 283 doesn’t exist – it seems to have dropped out of the Regulations sometime in the last 10 years or so.
For current legislation:
CAR 5.51 http://www.comlaw.gov.au/ComLaw/Legi...on1988Vol2.pdf
CAR 282 - 286 http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/Legi...on1988Vol3.pdf
So if CASA do take regulatory action against a pilot, under what laws/parts of law are they acting?
What evidence is required to prove suspected logbook fraud? Is exaggeration of flight hours the same as falsification?
If you are made aware that someone is currently, or has in the past been exaggerating flight time in their log book what are your legal obligations?
Are there any implications for an organizations Chief Pilot if they are aware that a pilot employed in their organization has inflated flight time in the past? If they continue to do so while employed by the organization as a pilot?
What are the insurance implications for the organization if they allow that pilot to use their aircraft, knowing that there may be false or inflated flight time?
Would you employ a pilot if you had suspicions about the accuracy of their log book? Does this reflect on their general integrity, would this person be a risk of breaches of professionalism in other aspects of their flying, or is it a common enough occurance to be allowable under some circumstances with careful monitoring?
Your comments and advice are appreciated.
Cheers,
Spotty Dog
My questions are about log book fraud/ false entries/’massaging’ of flight time in Australia.
I have been told that some slight adjustment of figures is common, especially amongst low hour pilots (e.g. adding an additional 0.1 to some flights).
Is this actually common practice?
If so, at what point do you ppruners think this becomes excessive/fraudulent?( Is 0.1 on some flights allowable? Is 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, or 0.4 too much for a flight? Is any ‘adjustment’ just plain fraudulent?)
According to the CASA website : Civil Aviation Safety Authority - Pilot Log Books , falsification of flight time is a criminal offence. CAR 5.51 has a note saying “Note It is an offence against regulation 283 for a person to make a false or misleading statement in his or her personal log book , but CAR 283 doesn’t exist – it seems to have dropped out of the Regulations sometime in the last 10 years or so.
For current legislation:
CAR 5.51 http://www.comlaw.gov.au/ComLaw/Legi...on1988Vol2.pdf
CAR 282 - 286 http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/Legi...on1988Vol3.pdf
So if CASA do take regulatory action against a pilot, under what laws/parts of law are they acting?
What evidence is required to prove suspected logbook fraud? Is exaggeration of flight hours the same as falsification?
If you are made aware that someone is currently, or has in the past been exaggerating flight time in their log book what are your legal obligations?
Are there any implications for an organizations Chief Pilot if they are aware that a pilot employed in their organization has inflated flight time in the past? If they continue to do so while employed by the organization as a pilot?
What are the insurance implications for the organization if they allow that pilot to use their aircraft, knowing that there may be false or inflated flight time?
Would you employ a pilot if you had suspicions about the accuracy of their log book? Does this reflect on their general integrity, would this person be a risk of breaches of professionalism in other aspects of their flying, or is it a common enough occurance to be allowable under some circumstances with careful monitoring?
Your comments and advice are appreciated.
Cheers,
Spotty Dog
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CIVIL AVIATION REGULATIONS 1988 - REG 5.52
What must be recorded in a personal log book?
(1) The holder of a flight crew licence, a special pilot licence or a certificate of validation must record in his or her personal log book:
(a) the holder's full name, address, date of birth and aviation reference number; and
(b) any information about each flight undertaken by the holder that CASA directs be recorded in the log book; and
(c) the time spent by the holder practising simulated flight in an approved synthetic flight trainer.
Penalty: 10 penalty units.
Note : It is an offence against regulation 283 for a person to make a false or misleading statement in his or her personal log book.
(2) CASA may give directions in Civil Aviation Orders setting out the information about each flight undertaken by the holder of a flight crew licence, a special pilot licence or a certificate of validation that the holder must record in his or her personal log book.
(3) CASA must not give a direction under subregulation (2) unless it is necessary to do so in the interests of the safety of air navigation.
(4) A person must not contravene a direction under subregulation (2).
Penalty: 10 penalty units.
(5) A direction does not have effect in relation to a person until it is given to the person.
(5A) An offence against subregulation (1) or (4) is an offence of strict liability.
Note For strict liability , see section 6.1 of the Criminal Code .
(6) In this regulation:
"aviation reference number" means the number given to the holder of a flight crew licence, a special pilot licence or a certificate of validation by CASA when his or her first licence or certificate is issued.
What must be recorded in a personal log book?
(1) The holder of a flight crew licence, a special pilot licence or a certificate of validation must record in his or her personal log book:
(a) the holder's full name, address, date of birth and aviation reference number; and
(b) any information about each flight undertaken by the holder that CASA directs be recorded in the log book; and
(c) the time spent by the holder practising simulated flight in an approved synthetic flight trainer.
Penalty: 10 penalty units.
Note : It is an offence against regulation 283 for a person to make a false or misleading statement in his or her personal log book.
(2) CASA may give directions in Civil Aviation Orders setting out the information about each flight undertaken by the holder of a flight crew licence, a special pilot licence or a certificate of validation that the holder must record in his or her personal log book.
(3) CASA must not give a direction under subregulation (2) unless it is necessary to do so in the interests of the safety of air navigation.
(4) A person must not contravene a direction under subregulation (2).
Penalty: 10 penalty units.
(5) A direction does not have effect in relation to a person until it is given to the person.
(5A) An offence against subregulation (1) or (4) is an offence of strict liability.
Note For strict liability , see section 6.1 of the Criminal Code .
(6) In this regulation:
"aviation reference number" means the number given to the holder of a flight crew licence, a special pilot licence or a certificate of validation by CASA when his or her first licence or certificate is issued.
Note : It is an offence against regulation 283 for a person to make a false or misleading statement in his or her personal log book.
(I doubt anyone in the aviation industry would be surprised the CARs contain an incorrect reference, after all it has only taken 22 years so far for CASA to carry our their review.......)
Intentionally fudging a Log Book by 0.1, 1.0 or 10 hours is fraudulent and an offense under the Crimes Act.
There are no shades of grey. You can't be "a little bit guilty".
If CASA audits a pilot's Log Book they will reconcile pilot's logged hours against the aircraft MR (and/or other flight records) and ASA records.
The accuracy of your Log Book is your personal responsibility. Fudge your Log Book and you will be personally liable.
Don't even think about it.
This is a very interesting topic, and I'm glad you have brought it up (Gillard 2010 
).
In all seriousness I have seen all sorts of rules of thumb during my time in GA. The first company I worked for it was all logged off the VDO however these have a tendency to run too slow on the ground so some Pilots added extra to the VDO to compensate.
Another company I worked for added 0.1 to each landing and measured flight time as your wheels off wheels on time. In a bungles queue you could wait an extra 20 mins some days to get airborne and it would not be logged, as you only logged 0.1 for all ground time.
This is against the regs as you are technically not logging all your flight time!
Another company added 0.3 per landing which was for IFR or 0.1 a taxi and 0.2 for a run-up.
In the end I just logged my chocks to chocks time, although this usually equaled about 0.3 a sector which IMO is a pretty good rule of thumb.
). In all seriousness I have seen all sorts of rules of thumb during my time in GA. The first company I worked for it was all logged off the VDO however these have a tendency to run too slow on the ground so some Pilots added extra to the VDO to compensate.
Another company I worked for added 0.1 to each landing and measured flight time as your wheels off wheels on time. In a bungles queue you could wait an extra 20 mins some days to get airborne and it would not be logged, as you only logged 0.1 for all ground time.
This is against the regs as you are technically not logging all your flight time!
Another company added 0.3 per landing which was for IFR or 0.1 a taxi and 0.2 for a run-up.
In the end I just logged my chocks to chocks time, although this usually equaled about 0.3 a sector which IMO is a pretty good rule of thumb.
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I wonder if what you're thinking of is the relatively common practice of adding 0.1 to flight-times, to allow for taxi-times at the start/end of a flight. A practice that as far as I'm aware is quite legal.
Now, it's been a long time since I studied aviation law -and then, that was in NZ; but within the CAR's, there used to be -as a definition of loggable time- words to the effect of: "from the time the aircraft 1st moves under it's own power for the purpose of flight, until the aircraft comes to rest at the end of that flight". Given that most operators record aircraft total-times, MR flight times etc. on squat-switch timers, tacho timers or pre-determined block-times, the practice of adding 0.1/0.2 to those times where appropriate is both legal and bl@@dy nearly mandated in law IMO!
One thing I can freely guarantee you right now is, your question is going to be the catalyst for some pretty serious and robust debate here -starting any minute now
Grab some popcorn and settle in for the entertainment!!!
Now, it's been a long time since I studied aviation law -and then, that was in NZ; but within the CAR's, there used to be -as a definition of loggable time- words to the effect of: "from the time the aircraft 1st moves under it's own power for the purpose of flight, until the aircraft comes to rest at the end of that flight". Given that most operators record aircraft total-times, MR flight times etc. on squat-switch timers, tacho timers or pre-determined block-times, the practice of adding 0.1/0.2 to those times where appropriate is both legal and bl@@dy nearly mandated in law IMO!
One thing I can freely guarantee you right now is, your question is going to be the catalyst for some pretty serious and robust debate here -starting any minute now
Grab some popcorn and settle in for the entertainment!!!
Moderator
In the end I just logged my chocks to chocks time.....
Any other "rule of thumb" could potentially run you into conflict with CASA.
If the rules of thumb are going to land you in trouble, I'd like to know what accuracy is required when logging the times then.
Nearest 0.1hr? Nearest 0.01hr? Nearest 1hr?
Typical Aussie GA... my way is correct and any other method is wrong and you will all be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Use any reasonable rule of thumb you like, with a dash of common sense!
Nearest 0.1hr? Nearest 0.01hr? Nearest 1hr?
Typical Aussie GA... my way is correct and any other method is wrong and you will all be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Use any reasonable rule of thumb you like, with a dash of common sense!
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CAO 48 definition.
Simple really.
flight time means the total time from the moment when the aircraft first moves under its own power for the purpose of taking off until the moment it comes to rest at the end of the flight.
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From an aircraft operators perspective, my LAME told me on the weekend that I should be logging the engine run time, less 10% (for taxi time) and writing that in the maintenance release. Everyone seems to have their own rules for this stuff.
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Quote:
In the end I just logged my chocks to chocks time.....
And that is precisely what you are legally required to log.
In the end I just logged my chocks to chocks time.....
And that is precisely what you are legally required to log.
And that is the problem, the airswitch or timers driven by other digital inputs vary quite a bit.
The engine data for our a/c, and we do not sit around any longer than required to warm up the oil to the minimum temperature, and we do not do many flights under 30 min and many are 1-3 hours, shows a Hobbs/Tach ratio of 1.193, so thats about 0.2 of an hour per every hour flown.
If you want to be realistic in your averages then you need to take the TACH time and add about 0.2 or 0.3 per flight if you are being truthfull. I have timed it many times and it is usually a total of around 12 minutes for both taxi's and fuelling etc so on a fair and accurate estimate that I would be prepared to stand up in court and prove, 0.2 is it.
Food for thought
Easiest method I ever used back before I joined the airlines was SUDS (Start Up Down Stop).
Up and Down went into the aircraft tech log. Start and Stop went into my logbook.
No fuss working off tachos, air switches or "rules of thumb".
Up and Down went into the aircraft tech log. Start and Stop went into my logbook.
No fuss working off tachos, air switches or "rules of thumb".
It's as per CAO 48 definition with an allowable error of -/+ 3 minutes as .1 of an hour is 6 mins.So 9mins is .1 and 10 mins is .2 etc.And as it's a LEGAL requirement to carry a TIMEPIECE (not mobile phone digital time read-out) measuring hours/minutes/seconds under CAO20.18.Hopefully we can all read the time!!Any other interpretation of this by operators is ILLEGAL.
Any other interpretation of this by operators is ILLEGAL.
In my last job I recorded actual taxi and takeoff times because that was what worked best on that particular operation.
mates rates, I hope you haven't been incorrectly teaching your students that the ONLY way to calculate logged time is to measure it exactly on your watch!
This is exactly what I was referring to in my first post on this thread. The ones that get all high and mighty telling everyone how it MUST be done usually are the ones that get it wrong.
(BTW, if you are going to use that method, which is fine, when your watch says 9 minutes its 0.2. You don't need to wait for it to say 10 minutes. Have a think about it.)
Back on topic, however, I have heard of a bunch of instructors at a particular flying school beefing up their multi time (and saving money at the same time because they were only paying airswitch) by taxiing to the runup bay and spending a significant amount of time there, flying a couple of quick circuits, and calling it a day. Perfectly within the rules but sickens me nonetheless. They would have spent even less and got a whole lot more out of doing a few hours ICUS on some real operations in a PA31. What ya reckon GG?
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Originally Posted by Fly-by-Desire
Why is a mobile phone not a timepiece?
Additionally when I was studying all this (and I suspect when the rules/regs were written) it was all pre-cellphones! That may have some bearing also
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Oxford Dictionary
timepiece,
noun,
an instrument, such as a clock or watch, for measuring time
timepiece,
noun,
an instrument, such as a clock or watch, for measuring time
If I do 4 sectors in a day with 5mins worth of taxiing at each end + 10mins for a RunUp at the beginning of the day thats 0.6 added to the Switch for my Logbook.
If I had instead added a 'standard' 0.2 per sector that makes 0.8 to be added for my logbook.
That's a difference of 0.2 per day, 1.0 per week...... adding up isn't it. A years worth of logging like this and I could easily inflate by 40-50hours per year.
You need to be accurate with this stuff, avoid using the 'rule of thumb'. How you time it is up to you but I also use 'Blocks to Blocks' on a stopwatch. That "Start, Up, Down, Stop" idea also sounds pretty good though.
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If you are taking a shot at my 0.2, bare in mind different ops will have different numbers. Mine are private/business and like Saturdays flight to NBR and back it was say 1h50 down and about 1hr30 back plus a warm up and taxi/backtrack and a refuel and taxi at the end of the day. So 2 sectors only.
If you are doing lots of sectors in a day and smaller durations then 0.2 would be way over the top.
In my example above the flight time on the engine TACH time was 3.4 and logged as 3.8, or only 11% which is far below the 19% average.
You need to have a reliable and accurate method of doing this that you can prove.
J
If you are doing lots of sectors in a day and smaller durations then 0.2 would be way over the top.
In my example above the flight time on the engine TACH time was 3.4 and logged as 3.8, or only 11% which is far below the 19% average.
You need to have a reliable and accurate method of doing this that you can prove.
J
Exactly Jaba In certain ops airswitch plus .1 is simply no where near an accurate indication of chocks on to chocks off in say circuit ops in a Baron/Bo on a short runway where for safety each landing is a full stop and taxi back to the end of the runway - perhaps wait at the holding point etc etc. A session of circuits of .5 airswitch could be up to 1.0 in chocks to chocks time.
And another one......
4 x 10 mins of taxiing plus 10 mins is 50 minutes, which to most people is 0.8.
The same as 0.2 per sector.
You have shown that the two are the same in your particular operation. I log 0.1 per sector as per my company's ops manual because on average the total taxi time is going to be less than 9 minutes.
This is an accepted method of complying with the rules of logging flight time. What part of that do some of you not understand?
If I do 4 sectors in a day with 5mins worth of taxiing at each end + 10mins for a RunUp at the beginning of the day thats 0.6 added to the Switch for my Logbook.
If I had instead added a 'standard' 0.2 per sector that makes 0.8 to be added for my logbook.
That's a difference of 0.2 per day, 1.0 per week...... adding up isn't it. A years worth of logging like this and I could easily inflate by 40-50hours per year.
If I had instead added a 'standard' 0.2 per sector that makes 0.8 to be added for my logbook.
That's a difference of 0.2 per day, 1.0 per week...... adding up isn't it. A years worth of logging like this and I could easily inflate by 40-50hours per year.
The same as 0.2 per sector.
You need to be accurate with this stuff,
This is an accepted method of complying with the rules of logging flight time. What part of that do some of you not understand?
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4 x 10 mins of taxiing plus 10 mins is 50 minutes, which to most people is 0.8.
The same as 0.2 per sector.
The same as 0.2 per sector.
Jaba
I didn't intend on having to explain the details in my numbers, these are just the actual times that I have recorded from chocks to chocks. My intention was to illustrate how important it is to log accurate times. i.e. what you are actually flying rather than settling for a 'rule of thumb'. It isn't hard to note your chocks out at the start and chocks in at the end and using the difference.