Commercial certificate question

I had an unusual one re X-C experience required for commercial. A guy I
worked with was ex air force. He had been a tanker pilot (KC-whatever,
tanker version of 707). Never bothered to get a civilian airman
certificate. Years later, at work, we were chatting, and he said he would
like to start flying again. We decided to go straight from student
certificate to commercial (this was prior to the major re-write of FARs).
We reviewed his military logbook, and we were not able to verify experience
requirement for X-C; could not find flights with landings more than x miles
from departure point.

Local FAA inspector reviewed logs and decided that if this guy could fly a
tanker on a trip of a few thousand miles, meet his refueling customers, and
get back to his point of origin for the only landing of the flight, he met
the intent of the requirment.

Local FAA inspector reviewed logs and decided that if this guy could fly a
tanker on a trip of a few thousand miles, meet his refueling customers, and
get back to his point of origin for the only landing of the flight, he met
the intent of the requirment.

Does this carry the force of law? That is, some time in the future, if
a different FSDO inspector questions the validity of flight experience,
can he (or can he not) retroactively find that he did not at that time
meet the regs requiring XC flights, and therefore all subsequent ratings
are void, and subsequent flights are illegal?

Jose
--
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for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

Jose wrote in
:

Local FAA inspector reviewed logs and decided that if this guy could
fly a tanker on a trip of a few thousand miles, meet his refueling
customers, and get back to his point of origin for the only landing
of the flight, he met the intent of the requirment.

Does this carry the force of law? That is, some time in the future,
if a different FSDO inspector questions the validity of flight
experience, can he (or can he not) retroactively find that he did not
at that time meet the regs requiring XC flights, and therefore all
subsequent ratings are void, and subsequent flights are illegal?

Jose

I have no idea. The commercial certificate, with instrument rating, was
issued promptly. We all (my "student", the FAA inspector, and I) had a
good laugh over the situation. This all happened more than 30 years ago.

Jose wrote:
Local FAA inspector reviewed logs and decided that if this guy could fly a
tanker on a trip of a few thousand miles, meet his refueling customers, and
get back to his point of origin for the only landing of the flight, he met
the intent of the requirment.

Does this carry the force of law? That is, some time in the future, if
a different FSDO inspector questions the validity of flight experience,
can he (or can he not) retroactively find that he did not at that time
meet the regs requiring XC flights, and therefore all subsequent ratings
are void, and subsequent flights are illegal?


If I were on a jury presented with that scenario, you can be sure I'd laugh the
FAA out of the room. I'd say anybody who made intercontinental flights for the
military certainly outtrumps the cross country experience *I* used to earn my
commercial license. Ony a pencil pusher would ignore the intent of the reg.



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN

VE

"Mortimer Schnerd, RN" wrote in message
.. .

Jose wrote:
Local FAA inspector reviewed logs and decided that if this guy could fly
a
tanker on a trip of a few thousand miles, meet his refueling customers,
and
get back to his point of origin for the only landing of the flight, he
met
the intent of the requirment.

Does this carry the force of law? That is, some time in the future, if
a different FSDO inspector questions the validity of flight experience,
can he (or can he not) retroactively find that he did not at that time
meet the regs requiring XC flights, and therefore all subsequent ratings
are void, and subsequent flights are illegal?


If I were on a jury presented with that scenario, you can be sure I'd
laugh the FAA out of the room. I'd say anybody who made intercontinental
flights for the military certainly outtrumps the cross country experience
*I* used to earn my commercial license. Ony a pencil pusher would ignore
the intent of the reg.



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN

VE




I missed the beginning of this thread but see FAR 61.73 which sets forth
rules for former military pilots.