Logging Time

[Flyboyz]

I recently met another pilot at my local FBO and the subject of flight time came up. His story, amount of hours, and age didn't quite add up. It seems a lot of his time and stories were imaginary or he was also logging FS2004 time.

However, I began to ask myself because I have never run into this before, is there some sort of log book police out there? Is your time maintained somewhere in the FAA? If it is, which I think it is when you fill out your medical paperwork, do employers get copies of those records from the FAA to verify? Or is your time solely based on the honor code?

Just wondering.

 

[I.P. Freley]

The only way your time is "maintained" by the FAA is what you report to them when you get a new medical (you know, the total time and time in the last six months) or what you report on the form (the name of which I forgot) when you apply for a new rating.

I don't think there's any reason the FAA would question anyone's claims of their flight time unless you are being investigated... And I think that an FAA background check will only supply a company with your ratings and the status of your medical (specifically the date and class of your last medical).

 

[RichardRambone]

LOL thats great about logging FS2004 time. I guess I flew PIC on the Wright Flyer!

 

[RichardRambone]

But seriously I dont think anyone maintains a database except whats forementioned above. Remember when Aaliyah's plane crashed? Investigators were looking at the pilots logbook and there seemed to be descrepencies such as padding his logbook. Not to mention he was coked out.

 

[JeffSKDTW]

the form (the name of which I forgot) when you apply for a new rating.

It's the 8710.

 

[I.P. Freley]

LOL thats great about logging FS2004 time. I guess I flew PIC on the Wright Flyer!

When I was a flight instructor, I answered the phone at the school one day and was treated to a discussion with a soon-to-be student of ours that rather cockily explained to me that he'd need no ground school and would also require only two or three lessons before he soloed... Not because he'd had any prior flight training or ground school but because he had, and I quote, "logged over two hundred hours" on whatever the most recent version of FS was at the time (97, maybe? this was in late 99 or the first month or two of 2000). It wasn't that he didn't THINK he'd need any ground lessons, he said he REFUSED to have any ground lessons as they were a waste of his time and a way for us to pad his fees, and if he took more than four or five lessons to solo, he was going to find another school. I would've told him that I thought he should find another school regardless, but "the boss" was standing next to me and he was one of those "absolutely anyone can be taught to fly" guys... If your student was a disaster and couldn't tell left from right, it was YOUR fault, so I was expected to talk this guy down and bring him to let the wallet-draining commence.

I never had the heart to ASK, but I got the distinct impression that he meant what he said, he'd dutifully entered every flight sim session into an actual LOGBOOK. Since I took the call, I assigned this treasure of a prospective student to an instructor who I didn't have a great fondness for.

 

[Biatch5]

But seriously I dont think anyone maintains a database except whats forementioned above. Remember when Aaliyah's plane crashed? Investigators were looking at the pilots logbook and there seemed to be descrepencies such as padding his logbook. Not to mention he was coked out.

Speaking about that. I know for a fact he severaly pencil whipped his logbook

That idiot of a pilot flew with a good friend of mine in a Cessna 402 down to Haiti only 3 times and he was never in a 402 before. After those 3 flights, he never saw him again.

Well when the crash happened, that pilot logged more than 300 hours in a 402 with my good ol friend and he had to go see the FAA/NTSB about that because his name was in that pilot's logbook (the one who killed Aliyah).

Funny thing is... Yeah the pilot was an idiot for pencil whipping his logbook, flying for a 134.5 charter operator and having drugs in his body

but besides that

no one saw on TV what a d!ick the 300+ bodyguard was now did you? Another buddy of mine was in Marsh HArbour the very next day after the Aliyah crash and talked to Customs officers there and they all said that the bodyguard was threatening the pilot, yelling.... screaming... telling the pilot that you will take all of our stuff.

OH BUT YOU DIDNT HEAR THAT ON TV NOW DID YOU.... Sad what happened...Definetly could have been avoided. God Rest their souls

 

[midlifeflyer]

It's on the honor system. But if something happens, the FAA tends to look at the logs and if it looks funny, may use it's investigation powers to look a bit deeper. The guys who falsify their logbooks usually aren't that bright (at least not as bright an they think they are). There's usually a trail that can catch the more flagrant violators.

Consider: logbook shows pilot logs 300 hours PIC in his Piper Arrow over the course of a year. Maintenance record show the airplane only flew 79 hours that year between annuals..

 

[minitour]

It's the 8710.

and even that wouldn't "Count" since you need only put in the "minimum" amount...

Just the medical is all I can think of...but if you're pencil-whipping........

-mini

 

[User546]

no one saw on TV what a d!ick the 300+ bodyguard was now did you? Another buddy of mine was in Marsh HArbour the very next day after the Aliyah crash and talked to Customs officers there and they all said that the bodyguard was threatening the pilot, yelling.... screaming... telling the pilot that you will take all of our stuff.

I've heard the same thing as well... however you can't let someone like that, big or small, pressure you into compromising safety. If you overload your aircraft by 500+ pounds, the airplane is still going to refuse to fly - despite what the bodyguard or other person is pressuring you to do. I'd rather be out of a job, then laying in a graveyard.

Of course thats easier to say then do sometimes, but pilots sometimes tend to forget they have the final say about whether an airplane goes or not - sometimes that decision can be the difference between life and death.