Do you use your night rating?

RV14 wrote:

Not sure I would agree with you on that one. A few years ago HEMS pilot lost eyesight forever after a laser strike in the vicinity of my airport.

Can you provide the source for that? Maybe I’m wrong but whatever I read about laser attacks was causing temporary blindness and no crash was recorded due to laser attack.

RV14 wrote:

Again, YMMV Just landed after a short nigh flight. The aircraft was ca 7 knots slower than is should have been. Tried to light the flashlight over the wings to find the root cause. Nothing. Only after landing I’ve noticed clear ice.

I’m sorry but I don’t get what’s the point here. That the ice in night flight is more dangerous than during the day? Or that you entered icing conditions without noticing that because it was too dark? Obviously with the aircraft that wasn’t supposed to enter icing conditions especially without outside visibility in what was supposed to be night VFR flight. Few more words about the situation, conditions and aircraft would be beneficial for understanding what was going on in this case.

Airborne_Again wrote:

Then why did you ask about night VFR risks!?

Where exactly did I ask about night VFR risk?

Airborne_Again wrote:

A visual approach doesn’t have a DA/MDA.

I agree, I didn’t get it was visual approach as end of IFR flight. However, shooting visual approach in the night from far distance and not noticing altitude check against runway distance is not the best airmanship. In Croatia ATC probably wouldn’t approve this in night conditions except for circle to land which is not exactly visual approach but kind of longer visual segment of approach.

Emir wrote:

Can you provide the source for that?

the perpetrators ware never found

sorry only local version available

Emir wrote:

Where exactly did I ask about night VFR risk?

That’s what the thread is about, isn’t it? It was started by UdoR who just very recently got an IR. In any case:

Emir wrote:

RV14 wrote:

The point I’m trying to make is that IMHO engine failure is not the greatest danger of single pilot night flying

And which ones are more dangerous if you don’t mind sharing?

Emir wrote:

I agree, I didn’t get it was visual approach as end of IFR flight. However, shooting visual approach in the night from far distance and not noticing altitude check against runway distance is not the best airmanship.

This was at a time long before GPS and IIRC there was no DME either.

Do I use my night rating? The answer is yes, but not properly. My 16 hours break down into:

• 5 hours for the training
• many flights landing a few minutes after SS+30
• a few local flights / circuits
• a few cross country flights in the US

It’s so peaceful: the air is dead calm, little traffic, and quiet on the radio.

I’m UK-based, so extra PPR to make sure airfields are open and lit. The infrastructure is there, just not the will to use it. The system seems to be set up against night flying. It’s a real shame because I would like to do more.

France, where in daytime you just turn up, also needs PPR for lighting, even PCL.

The US was great: fly direct, click the radio a few times, land. How it should be. One of the local airports, KSPG, has a reasonable restaurant, so regularly flying out for dinner is easy.

I had a very unpleasant experience once, climbing over the pitch-black Gulf of Mexico, maybe vertigo? Just a one-off, but highlights the need for instrument skills.

A few old photos:

Downtown Clearwater on the left, Clearwater Beach on the right, with the causeway in between.

KPIE with crosswind

KCLW

Edit: the photos never came out, but I did a local flight late on New Year’s Eve about 10 years ago, and it was great watching the fireworks from above.

I definitely liked the possibility while I had suitable airplane. It eliminated the rush to get home before sunset. It gave me confidence to fly relying solely on instruments – we have enough scarcely populated areas so you needed to do that. And there are frequent situation where you might be technically “sever VMC”, but in fact unable to use anything as a reference- i.e flying over sea.

Unfortunately the current national regulations don’t permit night VFR for ultralights, so I don’t have the option right now.

@Capitaine much of France does not need PPR for PCL. It is usually only needed when you need someone to leave the switch on when they leave. And then it’s not usually PPR it’s a “can you leave the lights on standby when you leave tonight?”🙂

I don’t have a night rating, mainly because there isn’t one for night flying in the US. I have logged a little over 600 hours of night. I don’t do night flights now, mainly because I don’t stay up that late and the airport is an hour and a half away round trip. For the first time in years, I did a night flight to get night current for carrying passengers, but it lapsed a few weeks ago without taking any passengers up at night. I don’t need to be night current if I am by myself or giving dual instruction. The latter is because a student is not a passenger if I am giving them instruction. So I can go with a pilot that is not current and not be current myself, and give them dual takeoffs and landings to get them current at dark night (aka between 1 hour after sunset to 1 hour before sunrise), but can’t get current myself, although maybe I could claim that I demonstrated 3 takeoffs and landings first? Night flying has a few positive aspects and a few negative ones. On the positive side, it is often prettier, smoother, easier to see traffic and often easier to locate the airport, at least the rotating beacon. On the negative side, an engine out presents more challenge. I was trained to troubleshoot, setup a glide, and when 500 feet above the ground, turn the landing light on. If you don’t like what you see, turn it off :). Actually, I generally will fly higher at night to provide greater gliding distance to make it to an airport if needed. Judging the height above the ground is more difficult at night when landing, but practice with and without internal lights and landing lights helps build night skills. Definitely want to bring along a flash light and spare batteries at night, just in case you have a panel light failure or a general electrical system failure. Obstacle avoidance on landing is greatly helped if the airport is equipped with a VASI or PAPI or other VGSI. One also needs to recognize that the runway lights flickering is not good. Another risk is with pilot operated lights, they are usually on a timeout and nothing is more disconcerting then to be on final, VFR or IFR and have the lights go out or in the case of IFR, not to go on in the first instance. With night flights you have to rely more on your instruments to avoid disorientation on takeoff or landing and since clouds are often impossible to see, flying into one can be unanticipated. When there is a full moon +/- one often has a good idea what is underneath visually. Another night risk is night vision and the use of oxygen at lower altitudes than one would use during daylight.

I have 8% of my flight hours by night, split in half between training and solo.

I never used the night rating in anger because night caught up on me.

But I would say I “used” my rating a couple times when I planned to fly at night to enjoy the views.
One of these night flights was with my now-wife when we were just dating, on her first airplane ride ever (flew out by day, flew back by night). The night flying pleased her so just for that it was all worth it