transpac said:
Well, as I understand the orginal question, it concerned "required" SICs, as defined in Part 135.101. The poster wanted to know if a SIC could be used in lieu of an autopilot. Since only IFR passenger carrying operations exercise autopilot authorizations, my assumption is that he wasn't referring to a "pretend" setup in a VFR or cargo scenario.
Well, that's the trouble, the original question was very vauge, and quite a few assumptions have been made here, including by you.
The actual question was:
Can you log SIC time flying for a 135 operator if the aircraft is flown single pilot when a SIC is not available? Example of aircraft could be a Caravan, BE99, or Metroliner ect...
And it says nothing about passenger operation, nor autopilots. As written the question could include pax or cargo operations with or without autopilots, under IFR or VFR.
transpac said:
The Chief Counsel has published an opinion to the effect that the presence of an autopilot authorization does not preclude an operator from assigning a qualified SIC to a flight and does not preclude such a SIC from logging the time.
Agree, in that specific situation. In a previous post I said that it was a grey area, in digging I found that, like you say, it is addressed in an interpretation, and the A/P in lieu of SIC does not preclude the SIC from logging time.....so not a grey are after all. Beyond that specific situation, the Chief COunsel is quite clear, "designating" an SIC when one is not otherwise required does not allow that SIC to log SIC time. That was my position from the begining. I may not have expressed that clearly.
transpac said:
The answers and quotes from A Squared (and apparently you also) concern non-required SICs as defined by 135.101. The result of all this is confusion with each individual modifying the question to fit a pre-conceived answer.
Not that it's terribly important, but the original question was *very* general, and my initial answer,
in order to log SIC, the SIC has to be required. allowed does not equal required.
was appropriately general. As far as I can see, you are the only one who has thought the question was specifically about 135 IFR pax operations with an autopilot. To clarify, when I said "allowed" I didn't mean that a specific allowance was made in the ops specs, rather that as long as an SIC is qualified, trained and checked in accordance with part 135, it's perfectly legal for him to be assigned as an SIC, therfore "allowed" in a more general sense, ie: not prohibited.
I don't think that really we disagree on much here, other than perhaps about the scope of the original question. :beer: