EIR looks completely useless to me. Usual situation people are facing with is that DEP and/or ARR are not VFR while enroute segment is mostly in VMC aiming on top.
Emir wrote:
EIR looks completely useless to me.
The ATO where I am doing my CB-IR at the moment is of the same opinion, refuses to do EIR training.
The EIR has some specific benefits especially in conjunction with the UK IMC Rating (which gives you a legal IAP at the UK end, where traditionally the wx is not so great) but above all it is a great p1sstake out of the European ATC system which in many places ritually denies you VFR but by changing the “V” to an “I” the waters part and the birds start singing – despite you flying in the same airspace and on the same route on which you would have been VFR, and if you play it right you can be in VMC the whole way enroute.
It’s a great Rating for “clever” VFR pilots who know how to play the game, specifically how to arrive “VFR” when the “hole in the clouds” isn’t, ahem, actually there. The best methods work at coastal airports 
I wouldn’t do it in Switzerland….
That said, I would never let someone I care about go flying unless they had a rock solid means of getting back down e.g. an ILS. With the EIR you have to declare a Mayday for that, which has huge psychological implications.
EIR looks completely useless to me. Usual situation people are facing with is that DEP and/or ARR are not VFR while enroute segment is mostly in VMC aiming on top.
That’s what I have been saying since the EIR details came out (and got some stick for it, mainly from VFR-only pilots, who know very little about practical IFR flying).
SEPs are very good for flying IMC departures and approaches, but flying enroute IMC in them is potentially problematic and uncomfortable. In other words: this reduced IR is actually the wring way around.
So, for practical usage in real-life (i.e. in order to improve depatch-rate) the EIR is mostly useless.
It is still not all bad, because it creates a stepping stone for private pilots, who would otherwise not dare to take the plunge of the full IR.
Arne wrote:
Emir wrote:
EIR looks completely useless to me.
The ATO where I am doing my CB-IR at the moment is of the same opinion, refuses to do EIR training.
That’s just silly. It’s a great stepping stone to the CB-IR and a very useful tool for cross country planning, it makes it so much easier. I am based at an uncontrolled airport, so my flights usually start out or end VFR anyway. I prefer smaller airfields as a destination too. Get fuel, pay and walk away. No handling, no security to fondle you every time you have to get to the plane. Weatherwise it is limited maybe, but I’m not a fan of hard IMC flying with a SEP anyway.
Peter wrote:
It’s a great Rating for “clever” VFR pilots who know how to play the game, specifically how to arrive “VFR” when the “hole in the clouds” isn’t, ahem, actually there.
Been there, done that and I’ll never reapeat it again. It was long time ago, flying VFR, I was overhead the airport but at high altitude and I was aiming such hole, found myself in TCU, in the mountainous area, banked, close to transiting to spiral, IAS dramatically rising and completely clueless how this happened in just few seconds. I managed to recover the aircraft from this unusual attitude, reported ATC I found myself in IMC and asked for vectoring for ILS (luckily I knew how to use it regardless the lack of training). You can imagine my relief once I broke from clouds at 3000 ft AGL with runway straight ahead.
Peter wrote:
The EIR has some specific benefits especially in conjunction with the UK IMC
In Norway I am sure the usefulness of a UK IMC similar rating vs EIR would be a factor 100:1 at least. I can’t think of a single reason to take the EIR, but a UK IMC similar thing could actually be useful, even for me 
Cpuple of remarks:
– as pointed out before, EIR is not daytime only.
– the privileges of the EASA IR and the CB IR are identical, they are the same rating.
Neither of the two gives HPA privileges. HPA is a block of theory you need to know before applying for a HPA type rating.
It is fully included in the ATPL theory.
Parts of it are included in the EASA IR theory
So the theory course for your first HPA aircraft will cover slightly more if you went the CB-IR route instead of the eASA-IR route.
So the theory course for your first HPA aircraft will cover slightly more if you went the CB-IR route instead of the eASA-IR route.
That is reportedly why some countries put a note on your IR that it was the CB IR and not the EASA IR – to make sure that if you go for the HPA you have to do the extra exams.
Interesting also that the EIR is no use where there is no [useful] night VFR. Nobody has thought of that before!
That’s unless you have a TB20 or similar with a ferry tank so you can do the enroute during legal night but the two ends during legal day It might even be possible without a ferry tank, in the summer… Poor risk management however, IMHO, to fly overnight if it is avoidable.
Been there, done that and I’ll never reapeat it again
The more usual method is to descend out over the sea, during the radio handover from enroute ATC to the approach/tower ATC. You are VFR (they can’t tell anyway) during the former and you will be VFR again, below the cloud, by the time you call up the latter
It has been done with coastal airports in France, Italy, Croatia, etc.
Cobalt wrote:
Neither of the two gives HPA privileges. HPA is a block of theory you need to know before applying for a HPA type rating.
It is fully included in the ATPL theory.
Parts of it are included in the EASA IR theory
So the theory course for your first HPA aircraft will cover slightly more if you went the CB-IR route instead of the eASA-IR route
I have an EASA IR converted from FAA IR, and I have done the HPA TK course as I fly HPA. It is not a big deal at all, a couple of days if I recall correctly, so not a significant factor in the decision process.
