Night Currency vs. Night Landings

[jcepiano]

Just to be sure, the FARs don't prevent us from becoming night current under the supervision of a CFI or do these takeoffs and landings need to be completed solo?

 

[woodchucker]

Just to be sure, the FARs don't prevent us from becoming night current under the supervision of a CFI or do these takeoffs and landings need to be completed solo?

As FAR as I know, you just need to be the manipulator at the controls. Even with a CFI, if you log 3 night take offs and landings with your instructor, it counts.

Leave it to the government to make something so obvious so obscure.

 

[woodchucker]

Oops, you're right, I'll fix the earlier post. That's sunset to sunrise so I guess the FAA has dibs on all three definitions. Strangely the requirement for strobes is attached to "night flight" so they aren't required until later (end of evening civil twilight).

From what I've learned, strobes and beacon are equivalent. You need one or the other, not both.

Maybe I'm wrong?

 

[azure]

Just to be sure, the FARs don't prevent us from becoming night current under the supervision of a CFI or do these takeoffs and landings need to be completed solo?

They can even be done with a non-instructor pilot who is night current (as long as they're willing to be PIC, with you as a passenger at the controls).

 

[azure]

Sunset at 16:36 (which really happened before that time, thanks to the mountains...) is annoying.

Of course sunrise at 04:31 in mid-June is equally as annoying. Stupid Daylight Savings...

Try New England if you think that's bad. Sunset at KMPV is 16:16 tonight... by early December it will be at 16:11... then it starts getting later again (even before the solstice, an interesting bit of astronomical trivia).

New England should be in the Atlantic time zone...

 

[Henning]

Another case of "holy thread resurrection!"

On November 24 I am flying from 3-5 p.m. Sunset at 4:53 p.m, so I'm good to carry passengers until 5:53 p.m.

You can log night flying and night landings starting at the end of civil twilight, which is 5:21 p.m. So, in theory, for night flying, I can carry passengers while logging night flying time from 5:21 until 5:53 p.m., correct?

I realize those night landings won't be good for anything currency-wise, so I just want to verify that I can log about 0.5 night flying while still having pax aboard.

Pretty much correct and it will be good for your 'currency' requirements, I think you mean to say it won't do any good for your proficiency requirements, and I dispute that, I find the transitional light landing situation to be the most difficult to see accurately in because your brain is trying to access the sensitive rods for the low light part of the scene, however the light is still to strong for the chemical reaction in the vitreous that enables that process, so you are basically missing some of the picture at that point.

 

[JimNtexas]

How to tell if it is night? Look out the window. If its dark out, it is night.

Are you crazy!??!! Don't you realize the logbook police SWAT unit is likely to kick down your door in the middle of the night, shoot your dog, and then shred your logbook if you don't use an atomic clock to compute when it's dark out??!

 

[nosehair]

They can even be done with a non-instructor pilot who is night current (as long as they're willing to be PIC, with you as a passenger at the controls).

Actually, neither pilot needs to be night current. I don't have the reference handy, but a ruling a few years back says the other pilot, for the purpose of night landing currency, is not a passenger. Both may get current with each doing the required TO & landings as sole manipulator.
Someone chime in with the reference?

 

[Skip Miller]

Actually, neither pilot needs to be night current. I don't have the reference handy, but a ruling a few years back says the other pilot, for the purpose of night landing currency, is not a passenger. Both may get current with each doing the required TO & landings as sole manipulator.
Someone chime in with the reference?

I will be pleasantly surprised if this is true. I have seen no regs, or even news of this change. But I won't believe this until I see it in the FARs. Until then, I won't bet my certificate on this advice.

-Skip

 

[Henning]

I will be pleasantly surprised if this is true. I have seen no regs, or even news of this change. But I won't believe this until I see it in the FARs. Until then, I won't bet my certificate on this advice.

-Skip

You'll never see it in the FARs, you will find this kind of stuff in the Chief Counsel Interpretations Database in the FAA's web site, and I'm not sure if the position has been addressed or not. I can see the arguments that make either case, and neither case is particularly overwhelming, but the con is stronger.

On the Pro, they are both pilots who could be sole manipulator of the flight physically.

The Con though is that there is only one PIC, and unless the pilot in the other seat is a CFI, the FAA can have no reasonable expectation that one could save the other from a crash.

I would be surprised to find it allowed.

 

[EdFred]

Try New England if you think that's bad. Sunset at KMPV is 16:16 tonight... by early December it will be at 16:11... then it starts getting later again (even before the solstice, an interesting bit of astronomical trivia).

New England should be in the Atlantic time zone...

You're just used to being at the west end of a time zone.

 

[flyingcheesehead]

Actually, neither pilot needs to be night current. I don't have the reference handy, but a ruling a few years back says the other pilot, for the purpose of night landing currency, is not a passenger. Both may get current with each doing the required TO & landings as sole manipulator.
Someone chime in with the reference?

I will be pleasantly surprised if this is true. I have seen no regs, or even news of this change. But I won't believe this until I see it in the FARs. Until then, I won't bet my certificate on this advice.

-Skip

You'll never see it in the FARs, you will find this kind of stuff in the Chief Counsel Interpretations Database in the FAA's web site, and I'm not sure if the position has been addressed or not. I can see the arguments that make either case, and neither case is particularly overwhelming, but the con is stronger.

On the Pro, they are both pilots who could be sole manipulator of the flight physically.

The Con though is that there is only one PIC, and unless the pilot in the other seat is a CFI, the FAA can have no reasonable expectation that one could save the other from a crash.

I would be surprised to find it allowed.

The interpretation is true, but NOT as described in the first quote as posted above. If it's a pilot and a *CFI*, neither is considered a passenger and neither needs to be current. Two pilots, one of them still must be current (and acting as PIC with all the other requirements that entails).

We agree that, for purposes of section 61.57(b), an authorized instructor providing instruction in an aircraft is not considered a passenger with respect to the person receiving instruction, even where the person receiving the instruction is acting as PIC. (The instructor must be current, qualified to instruct, and hold a category, class and type rating in the aircraft, if a class and type rating is required.) The instructor is not a passenger because he is present specifically to train the person receiving instruction. Neither is the person receiving instruction a passenger with respect to the instructor. This training may take place, even though neither pilot has met the 61.57(b) requirements.

 

[Henning]

The interpretation is true, but NOT as described in the first quote as posted above. If it's a pilot and a *CFI*, neither is considered a passenger and neither needs to be current. Two pilots, one of them still must be current (and acting as PIC with all the other requirements that entails).

That is as I expect it would be, two non night current pilots cannot fly together at night.

 

[nosehair]

Ah, OK, it only applies to a non-current CFI.
Thx 4 the correct reference.

 

[Henning]

Ah, OK, it only applies to a non-current CFI.
Thx 4 the correct reference.

It makes sense that way.

 

[poadeleted20]

Just to be sure, the FARs don't prevent us from becoming night current under the supervision of a CFI or do these takeoffs and landings need to be completed solo?

If you are not 61.57(b) current for night ops with passengers, you have three legal options to get current:

1. Go up solo.
2. Go up with a CFI
3. Go up with a non-instructor pilot who is legal to be PIC at night with passengers and is willing to act as PIC while you fly the plane.

 

[poadeleted20]

From what I've learned, strobes and beacon are equivalent. You need one or the other, not both.

Maybe I'm wrong?

Your strobes may or may not be legal as a sole-source anti-collision lighting -- you'd have to check the paperwork on the system, as some are but some aren't.

 

[poadeleted20]

Actually, neither pilot needs to be night current. I don't have the reference handy, but a ruling a few years back says the other pilot, for the purpose of night landing currency, is not a passenger. Both may get current with each doing the required TO & landings as sole manipulator.
Someone chime in with the reference?

That only counts for a CFI in the other seat, not another non-instructor pilot. See the Kortokrax interpretation. And that's true for 61.57(a) day currency, too -- see the Schaffner interpretation.

 

[tlglenn]

If I recall correctly the application for a rating asks how many night landings you have. So a landing after the end of civil twilight should be counted even if you can't use it for passenger carrying currency. And I think the aeronautical experience requirement for 100 hours of night flight time for ATP applicants can be partially met if you have an excess number of night landings.

 

[poadeleted20]

If I recall correctly the application for a rating asks how many night landings you have. So a landing after the end of civil twilight should be counted even if you can't use it for passenger carrying currency.

Correct.

And I think the aeronautical experience requirement for 100 hours of night flight time for ATP applicants can be partially met if you have an excess number of night landings.

Also correct -- see 61.159(b) for details.