mh wrote:
The number of PPL(A) licenses have increased from 1594 licenses in 2000 to 2165 licenses in 2011, when EASA published and implemented the first steps towards easier rules.
Now I understand. The table does not show the number of PPL licenses. It shows the number of active PPL licenses and the number of newly issued PPL licenses: In other words: The number of active pilots actually flying (or at least with valid ratings and medicals), and the number of new pilots.
Here I have accumulated all the newly issued PPLs from that table. If you sum up all of them from 2000 to 2015, you will already go way past the current number of active PPL
Only a fraction of those who take the PPL actually continue to be active pilots. Just counting the number of PPL licenses around with not give you a meaningful number, because maybe only 25% ? of those are active pilots at any given time. Let’s assume (as the data shows) that it takes 15 years to accumulate new licenses to reach the same number as current active pilots, and this is true for all ages. Also it takes 15 years to get 2000 licenses.
15 years – 2000
30 years – 4000
60 years – 8000
We cannot expect any more than 8000 PPL licenses in total, because people eventually die. The number of active PPL vs total PPL is 2/8 or 1/4, about 25%. Of those 8000, 133 die each year due to age (80 years). To keep the total at 8000, which means keeping the number of active PPLs at 2000, we therefore also have to get at least 133 new ones. From 2012, it’s only about 70 each year, only half of what is needed (we would need much more than that to keep ot at a level 20 years ago, maybe 300 new PPL each year).
I don’t think any country collects data on active pilots in GA. The nearest you get is valid medicals, but most people will keep their medical going even when e.g. they cannot afford to fly anymore or have been stopped by family pressures, because most hope to resume eventually.
One problem we have in GA is that a lot of people are training but most of them give up very early, so the number of pilots entering the scene is just the small difference between the input and those being lost. Another thing is that the people who do hang in there can hang in there for decades, which results in a very stagnant population. This makes statistical analysis very hard.
For some reason the UK CAA has never released some of the data they have which might indicate actually active pilots – because people declare current hours total on their medical application. But maybe they don’t record it.
Peter wrote:
I don’t think any country collects data on active pilots in GA. The nearest you get is valid medicals, but most people will keep their medical going even when e.g. they cannot afford to fly anymore or have been stopped by family pressures, because most hope to resume eventually.
Well, the table say active PPL. Swedish authorities also show numbers for active PPL. One can wonder what is actually meant, but it does not say PPLs with valid medical. On the medical, don’t we also report last year’s flown hours? I think we do, but not 100% sure. Have to take the medical very soon, so I will find out.
I would guess active PPL to mean with valid PPL and reported flown hours that is larger than 0.
Anyway, the point is that the total number of PPL is an irrelevant number. The relevant numbers are newly issued PPLs and active PPL. They are the only numbers that give an indication about the flying activity going on. Club flying typically correlates with new PPLs, while private flying correlates with active PPLs.
mh wrote:
Although I think you might confuse the CAMO with a Part 145 maintenance company? Because we have figured it is much easier and cheaper to have the CAMO issue the ARC than the workarounds.
No, it was simply a requirement I was told by several flight schools here but I actually doubt it is valid. That is why I asked.
My ARC gets done by a CAMO, but I am not in a CAMO as I don’t need the additional expense. Cost for the ARC is slightly higher, but it is a full airworthiness review every time rather than the continued airworthiness. Worked fine and saves quite a bit of expense. To be in a CAMO would mean at least 2000 CHF per year additional expense which I can do without.
LeSving wrote:
Swedish authorities also show numbers for active PPL. One can wonder what is actually meant, but it does not say PPLs with valid medical.
In the Swedish case it means PPLs with a valid class (or type) rating. Since these ratings expire if you stop flying, they figures do indicate the number of active pilots.
They expire if you stop revalidation.
So if e.g. 10000 people get the PPL every year and all of them give up immediately they get their PPL, the 2 year revalidation time will generate an “active” pilot population of 20000 pilots. That will also be supported by valid medicals because most of the initial medicals will last at least 2 years.
But in reality nobody will be flying on their PPL 
So one has to be very careful with statistics.
And GA does have a very high attrition rate. In the UK about 90% give up very soon. I don’t think anybody has data on how soon but according to some CAA speakers at presentations some 90% don’t reach 1st revalidation. So you are seeing a large transient effect, due to this 2 year delay.
But back to the topic I don’t see any of this EASA’s fault, not least because most people who get a PPL have barely heard of EASA especially as nearly all of them are renting so somebody else is dealing with maintenance and all that stuff.
Peter wrote:
But back to the topic I don’t see any of this EASA’s fault
To be honest, GA airports are probably the biggest enemies of GA (and by extension, their own worst enemy). So many otherwise good airfields in the UK have ludicrously short opening hours (e.g. keeping bankers hours on weekdays when evening flying conditions are often at their best) with only bureaucratic and occasionally costly means to be allowed to arrive “out of hours”, bizarre local procedures, yellow jacket jobsworths, etc. That’s not to say all of them have these problems, but enough do to severely limit the choice of where you can reasonably go.
While “off piste” airfields generally don’t have any of these problems (and are usually available SR-SS) unfortunately most of them aren’t near anything useful like a public transport route or a car hire office – and even when they are, many newly minted PPLs are anxious at flying to short and potentially bumpy airfields.
Peter wrote:
And GA does have a very high attrition rate. In the UK about 90% give up very soon. I don’t think anybody has data on how soon but according to some CAA speakers at presentations some 90% don’t reach 1st revalidation. So you are seeing a large transient effect, due to this 2 year delay.
Possibly, but by showing numbers for new PPLs along with active PPL you will get an idea. Of course I have plotted that as well
That percentage is 8 to 4, declining. This is not good, but it shows that the active pilots are mostly the ones that stay in the game, or that percentage would have been much larger. But then again a larger percentage would of course mean more new PPLs and this would be a good thing, even though a large percentage of them give up after a short while. It cannot possibly be 90% though, more like 10-20 at max.
Peter wrote:
But back to the topic I don’t see any of this EASA’s fault, not least because most people who get a PPL have barely heard of EASA especially as nearly all of them are renting so somebody else is dealing with maintenance and all that stuff.
As with most things, two of the most important things are price and availability (easy access). A high price together with a low availability is not good for business. Then add old and worn planes, and things gets very bad. Not all of this is EASA’s fault, but they could do a lot to get the price down and get newer planes in the mix.
In Switzerland we see a steady drop in the PPL numbers that began already in the 90s. In 1990 the number of PPLs was 8’174, nearly double as of today. EASA/JAA cannot be blamed for that. We had for many years a special situation as ultraligths were banned from 1984 until 2014. It was only in 2005 when some “ecolights” such as Remos, C42 and the likes were allowed. With soaring avgas prices renting old Cessnas and Pipers was getting very expensive.
