EASA threat to operation of N Reg Aircraft

[sooty3694]

In the case of an FAA ATP licence holder, who has IR priveledges included in his licence:

If he has at least the 50 hours of IR time as P1 in airplanes, could he or she take this route to add the IR to his EASA PPL?

[this is my username]

.... so if you have an FAA IR but all of your instrument time is as P2 on a multi-crew jet, does this mean you don't qualify for the conversion as you don't have 50hrs of PIC time?

[Tetrimmo]

Here a reply from EASA received by a Dutch pilot with meaning of the description "Flight time under IFR" with regards to ICAO IR conversion under EASA FCL.008



Question 1 : I read that now instead of “instrument flight time” … now “flight time under IFR” is written… What does this mean? The first was actual (S)IMC conditions. What is the second?

Answer: 1) ‘Flight time under Instrument Flight Rules’ (IFR) is defined in FCL.010. It means all flight time during which the aircraft is being operated under the Instrument Flight Rules. This means it can be also in VMC as long as it is under IFR.

Question 2. If one does not meet the 50 hours yet and what to advance faster than during normal flights, I presume that one can fly/train with a Safety or FI/IRI under SIMC conditions and that those hours will count as experience?

Answer 2: I assume you refer to situation, where the applicant holds a Part-FCL licence and in addition valid IR(A) issued in compliance with the requirements of Annex 1 to the Chicago Convention by a third country but does not yet have 50 hours PIC time under IFR. Please notice that the intention was that credited PIC time should be under IFR, so including also IFR in VMC.

[Keef]

A daft ruling if you ask me!

I have a bit over 100 hours of "real" flight in IMC recorded in my logbook. How many hours I flew IFR in VMC I dunno, but I wouldn't have thought it made me any more capable of flying in IMC.

But there you go.

[BillieBob]

But, in the mind of the bureaucrat, the IR gives the privilege of flight under IFR and, therefore, the qualifying experience must, logically, be gained under IFR or, to put it another way, IMC is not mentioned in the privileges and is therefore not relevant to the required experience.

This is what happens when one allows an activity to be regulated by people who have zero experience of it and no common sense.

[Jonzarno]

I see it differently. What's the difference if you are droning along on the autopilot in an airway whether you are in a cloud or not? You are still flying to a GPS waypoint, tracking a Navaid or on a radar heading and thus relying on instruments. That is always going to account for the bulk of most people's hours.

I do agree that that part of a pilot's experience is not terribly useful in finding out if they can hand fly a non precision approach to minimums or handle an in flight failure in IMC but that is not what is being measured.

FWIW: As i suppose most people do, I have always logged my actual IMC time and reckon it is not more than about 10% of the total time I have flown on IFR flight plans. Nice to see I'm so much more experienced than I thought. I feel like a better pilot already

[BEagle]

I'd heard a rumour somewhere that the UK CAA was trying to gold plate the 'flight time under IFR' ruling to include only such flight time where compliance with IFR was mandatory.

Which is, of course, utter bolleaux.

[mm_flynn]

Originally Posted by BEagle

I'd heard a rumour somewhere that the UK CAA was trying to gold plate the 'flight time under IFR' ruling to include only such flight time where compliance with IFR was mandatory.

Which is, of course, utter bolleaux.

To be fair, in the UK almost all ones time as a PPL could reasonably be under IFR as there is virtually no difference in the Instrument Flight Rules vs the Visual Flight Rules for a PPL complying with their licence restrictions.

[BillieBob]

To be fair, in the UK almost all ones time as a PPL could reasonably be under IFR

Except that an IR is now required to fly under IFR, something that not many PPL holders (or PPL instructors) have.

[mm_flynn]

I should have said 'until recently ...'

[sooty3694]

Regarding:

CRD to NPA 2011-16 (C)
RESULTING TEXT
26 Oct 2012
Page 778 of 991
I. Draft Opinion
DRAFT COMMISSION REGULATION (EU) No …/…
of […]
amending Commission Regulation (EU) No 1178/2011 laying down technical
requirements and administrative procedures related to civil aviation aircrew
pursuant to Regulation (EC) No 216/2008 of the European Parliament
and of the Council
(Text with EEA relevance)
THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION,
Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,
Having regard to Regulation (EC) No 216/2008 of the European Parliament and of the................etc etc etc

Would someone be kind enough to advise what happens next? Does this draft have to be approved, when will it be approved, and when, if approved, does it become law?

[bookworm]

So the next step is that EASA publishes an Opinion to the European Commission (which is ultimately responsible for the regulation). That should happen in 2013 Q1.

It then goes into a process called 'comitology'. There is a committee of member states (officially called the "Committee for the application of common safety rules in the field of civil aviation" but always referred to as the "EASA Committee", which is not, despite the name, part of EASA) that scrutinses the proposed legislation. They can encourage the Commission to amend it to get it passed by qualified majority vote, and such amendments are sometimes helpful, sometimes unhelpful.

Once it gets through the EASA Committee, it goes for translation, and then to the EU Parliament for scrutiny there. Unlike the previous process, it takes a special motion opposing the regulation to reject it and send it back to comitology. Such motions are very rare, and even more rarely successful. It then gets published in the OJEU.

Only after that is the AMC and GM finalised by EASA, and is published as an EASA Decision.

If you want to support the new rules, and you're outside the UK but in the EU then you should:

a) find out now who attends the EASA Committee for your state and
b) when the Opinion is published, express your support for the regulation to them or their organisation.