I will disappoint you (and probably others) @gallois, but the proceedings I’m aware of are still in the mill, and have been provided to me under confidentiality veil, so for now, not possible.
A sad trend of affairs, and as pointed by Peter and others on more than one occasion, certainly not an improvement in safety…
In the US all the “serious” pilots I know (by which I mean people who keep on flying for a long while) have an IR, and mostly keep it current.
My judgment is that about half of pilots who ‘keep on flying for a long time’ in the US have an IR, and about 25% of those that have an IR keep it current. If I’m right that would mean about 10-15% of “serious” private pilots in the US regularly use an IR in their flying. I’m sure this viewpoint varies depending on whether you fly out of a business oriented airport where the average guy has a four seat Cessna or Piper, versus a place where the average guy has a homebuilt, warbird or classic of some type. Both types of places and pilots exist in quantity and those in the latter places also travel a lot, they just do it out of the ATC ‘system’ when possible, as their preference. The latter category seems to include most retired professional pilots now flying only themselves around, enjoying more interesting planes and not trying to provide reliable service to anybody.
It’s amazing to read of the authoritarian approach taken to medical certification described here, from my perspective. Most people here view private pilot medical certification as a bit silly, including the AMEs who issue the relatively simple 3rd class medical to private pilots. Obviously given FAA Sport Pilot (no medical required), BasicMed (simple non-AME medical required to do almost anything for 4 years) and the forthcoming MOSAIC policy (no medical required to do what most people do) FAA medical certification from an AME is starting to fade into the past anyway, as a barrier to entry for reasonably fit people wanting to fly smaller private planes of all types.
Silvaire wrote:
It’s amazing to read of the authoritarian approach taken to medical certification described here, from my perspective. Most people here view private pilot medical certification as a bit silly, including the AMEs.
It amazes me too and reminds me to find the very nice woman pilot who pointed me to my current AME and thank her once again.
It really appears that the French medical certification is much more hassle than it is here thankfully, at least in my experience. I accidentally ran into a pilot today whom I know is back flying after a heart condition and he told me that after 3 years of monitoring he now can go to his normal AME again without additional checks. That is for a Class 1 however and multi crew cockpit.
What I do wonder @gallois, what would they do if you reduce your medical to LAPL only? This would still give you all the rights to fly everything up to 4 seats and 2 tons I believe minus the IR I believe? Would they still give you the full requirement for all the stuff you have to do now? I’ve been considering this as it brings some advantages, most of which is that you only get to do the exam every 2 years in my age, but it means the end of any ambitions to fly IFR. I also am not sure if there is a way back or if there even is the need anymore to actively and permanently change your PPL to a LAPL or if you simply can fly according to your medical, such as you can with an expired class 1 when you still have the class 2 privileges until those run out.
The Spanish way where you need an LAPL to fly ULMs appears to go in that direction.
I would be surprised if as many as 10% of PPLs in France have an IR.
The 10% figure came from my instructor – we both thought it was on the high side. The real figure is probably closer to 1%.
If I’m right that would mean about 10-15% of “serious” private pilots in the US regularly use an IR in their flying.
I stand by my statement, but that doesn’t mean the people I know are typical. For sure there are a LOT more trained and practising PPL/IRs in the US than in Europe. What the actual numbers are, I don’t really have any idea.
I think the biggest difference in the US is that many more people get an FAA IR, and that they can use it forever (it doesn’t ever expire) via a simple, non-bureaucratic, inexpensive process to establish currency. The latter makes more people motivated to get an IR in the first place because they are not taking on a burden just to keep what they earned, whether or not it’s in current use.
If I were to get nostalgic for working in a ‘system’ of people after retiring from work, I could imagine doing a IR just for the experience and as a mental workout. But I don’t have a lot of interest in procedural flying, flying ‘on rails’ in constant contact with ATC or maintaining IFR equipment and would not likely keep it current. People have different interests, the important regulatory thing is promoting people in fully pursuing their own.
The 10% figure came from my instructor – we both thought it was on the high side. The real figure is probably closer to 1%.
I recall posts by @nestor that France has ~1k IR holders, of whom nearly all fly entirely within France. With ~40k total of French GA pilots, that would be 2.5%.
@bordeaux_jim may also know the numbers.
This is probably average for Europe, compared with 20% to 40% (depending on where you look) for the US.
One important thing is that there is a huge correlation between having an IR and staying in GA for many years; the reasons are obvious
So IR holding should be supported, not criticised.
Of course some people, like Dan here, are able to use VFR as a good enough tool, but I know from 23 years in GA that this is extremely rare. But also Dan is based here
and not here
so he gets much more immediate value without even going too far. I know how to game the system with “VFR” pretty well – been doing “VFR in IMC” since the very start – but if I lived where I live and could not fly legally IFR on the mainland, I would have given up long ago.
many more people get an IR, and that they can use it forever (it doesn’t ever expire) via a simple, non-bureaucratic, inexpensive process to process to establish currency.
Absolutely! But Europe is too elitist to accept rolling currency.
The person called John has not posted for 10 years!
Please also do not use the @ notation where the person is likely to be active in the thread. He/she gets an email and his mailbox will just fill up with these emails. I get so many I just delete them immediately.
Peter,
I reckon you are aware that Dan is a retired Airline Pilot so je most definitly has the IR. His plane does not however as its experimental.
Which however rises a funny question… on his US flight would he have been legal.to fly IFR in the US as there experimental planes can fly IFR?
To answer that question (I cannot) one would start with the FAA special flight authorization which might then send you off looking at the documented foreign airworthiness limitations applied to the particular aircraft (or not) depending on whether the SFA references them.
“The Administrator may issue a special flight authorization for a foreign civil aircraft subject to any conditions and limitations that the Administrator considers necessary for safe operation in the U.S. airspace”
As a practical matter, once the plane is legally within US airspace, nobody in ATC is going to be very interested one way or another and I don’t think the transponder and pitot static check required for any FAA registered aircraft flying IFR would apply unless the SFA requires them – but I don’t know for sure, and that would be something to consider.
Practically speaking I think Silvaire is right. But under FAA rules when operating outside the US, you are always bound by the most restrictive of FAA and local regulation. So probably the same is true for any other registration too, i.e. you wouldn’t be legal in the US because you’re not legal in the country of registration. (Assuming Dan’s plane is not N-reg, of course – if it is then he can do what he wants in the US as long as it’s OK with the FAA).
