Perhaps the confusion is between MPA and MEP?

I remind you all again - if you are an airliner driver with a JAR-FCL ATPL, then nowadays you have no instrument privileges whatsoever on single pilot aircraft unless you also hold either a Single Pilot IR or an IMC Rating.

The latter is very much cheaper than the former!

I would not agree that the latter is cheaper.

Besides the renewal test costs being the same I also make allowance for the fact that if you allow the SPIR lapse, there is mandatory training requirements and that makes it very expensive to get it back in the future.

Keeping the MPIR and/or the IMCR valid does not get round that requirement.

My friend paid a lot of money to get their SPIR back even though they were current MPIR and current instrument flying. The Authority specified (as they can) a minimum of 4 hours MEP SPIR training...........a total waste of time and money but those were the requirements.

The CAA tried some years back to separate recreational and professional flying by saying that pilots who hold a CPL or ATPL would also have to get a PPL in order to have PPL privileges. It did not go down well then and I can't see much evidence of a shift in professional pilot opinion.

Regards,

DFC

Bose, I think where your assumptions and mine differ, is that you are assumming the airline pilot wishes to have a single pilot mutli rating, while I'm assuming they want to fly SEP's.

In my case they would be renewing their Mulit pilot IR and MEP in one go. Neither of which would sort them out for single pilot IR.

dp

Is there anyone still flying a DC6 or similar for a living these days?

I suppose there are the Atlantic pilots?


Even for night flight in the UK, the pilot has to complete at least one take-off and landing at night in the last 3 months before carrying passengers. Hard to do over the Summer period. The IR absolves them from that requirement.

Thus if I am heading back home from whereever in late Spetember and leave it a bit late so that the weather will clear, I do not have to worry that I have not flown this SEP at night for 6 months while loading my friends because I can fly at night with passengers on the basis of my SPIR. You can not do that with an IMC rating.

You also forget that I can renew my SPIR every second year in the FNPT2. I can not do that for the IMC rating which must be completed in the aircraft. Very easy to forward fast the sim........not possible in the aircraft.

There are very few poorly paid JAR-ATPL holders. i.e. not the ones who have never flown more than a C150 all their "career". If they can't afford the SPIR then they will be moving job and probably will not be paying to go flying in their recreational time.

Regards,

DFC

Sorry mate you still have it wrong. The number of PISTON aircraft that require two crew these days is so small I could count on a finger (or 2 at most). Multi pilot IR's are renewed only on the type being flown which is subject to a type rating.

An MEP rating has is renewed annually by test. I renew mine at the same time as my IR.

You can't renew an MEP while renewing a multi crew IR unless that is a multi crew MEP and as DFC points out the only people flying those these days are Atlantic and its only a couple of them.

Surely an airline pilot flying his 737, renews his type rating and his Multi pilot Me IR at the same time in his 737 or 737 sim?

That would satisfy his work requirements, but give him no single engine IR privlidges. :confused:

In the rest of the world DP, that would make perfect sense.

Unfortunately we're talking JAR and EASA here.......

Stellair,

Your comments regarding the NPPL are utter rubbish:

"The 'Brevet de base' is no different to an NPPL! They are both woefully insignificant qualifications to be flying a kite nevermind an aircraft with passengers on board."

The Brevet de base and NPPL are totally and utterly different. I've converted from an NPPL to PPL recently. When training for the original PPL my instructor asked me 90% of the way through the training which licence I was going for. The exams are the same, the amount of hours are virtually the same and the a/c i trained in are identical. I flew 300 hrs on my NPPL and every weekend - I know PPLs with less hours who fly so infrequently they have to refrsh with an instructor before a long distance trip - who would you rather send your daughter up with? The only difference training I needed was radio nav.

Just after I qualified with the original NPPL i flew up to scotland for a couple of weeks - a fab trip. During this 3 a/c were lost - all "full" PPL's and cause for 2 of these were CFIT. The logic in your statement is flawed.

I agree with the other posts, EASA is already a dinosaur and is a real threat to our wonderful sport!