How many hours to stay proficient?

Minimum hours per year to maintain VFR proficiency (pick closest number)

  • 25

    Votes: 15 18.8%

  • 50

    Votes: 50 62.5%

  • 75

    Votes: 7 8.8%

  • 100

    Votes: 7 8.8%

  • 125

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • 150 or more

    Votes: 1 1.3%
  • Total voters
    80
G

GauzeGuy

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GauzeGuy
Just looking for opinions. How many hours per year are needed to stay safe and proficient? To compare apples and apples, let's call this a ASEL VFR only pilot (no instrument rating, etc), flying a typical C172, PA28 or similar aircraft generally known to be docile?
 
I'd say 50 for VFR and 100 for VFR/IFR ASEL on average
 
What are you doing during those hours? 3 hours of ancake breakfasts runs is very different from 3 hours of air work with an instructor. I've seen pilots who were proficient on as little as 12-15 hours a year, and downright scary pilots who flew hundreds of hours a year.
 
Consider a pilot who flew 0 hours in one year. Perhaps he became proficient in No-Go decisions and remained safe that year...

How does one define proficiency?
 
I'd say fifty if they are spread out over the year fairly evenly.you don't want to loose the feel of the airplane and have to play catch up every flight.
 
skidoo said:
Consider a pilot who flew 0 hours in one year. Perhaps he became proficient in No-Go decisions and remained safe that year...

How does one define proficiency?
Click to expand...

His flying skills, decision making, communication skills, certainly would have been degraded after a year of no flying. He couldn't find good flying weather in a year? :mad2:
 
I could be persuaded that 50 is enough but I voted for 75 hours - a shade more than one hour per week as a way to keep the panoply of skills sharp. That is marginally enough to cover the wide range of day VFR experiences. It would include a longish cross-country or two, possibly crossing a frontal boundary and a fuel stop, some pancake breakfasts, 3-4-5 hours of CFI time or WINGS training including flight review, maybe a couple of day or overnight trips of one tank each way. Perhaps another way of looking at "the complete VFR pilot" might not be hours but exposure to different missions or types of flying and how long that pilot would need to stay sharp doing those tasks.
 
Define "Proficient"

Enough to satisfy a BFR?
25

Enough to pass a PTS?
50

Enough to satisfy an ATP?
100

Enough to satisfy Part 91?
5
 
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A long time ago, I wrote an article for Aviation Safety describing how a PP-ASEL could remain proficient for routine VFR flying in a light, simple single on 4 hours a month, but just barely. Having since flown with a good number of folks who fly less than 50 hours a year, I'll stick with that number.
 
Depends on the pilot. Some people lose their skills quickly. Some don't.
I knew someone didn't fly for a year and a half, bought a plane, got an IPC in that plane which they had never flown before, and was within PTS standards on the IPC before flying an approach to minimums on the way home.
 
oldShar said:
Define "Proficient"

Enough to satisfy a BFR?
25

Enough to pass a PTS?
50

Enough to satisfy Part 91?
5
Click to expand...

Don't the (private-pilot VFR) BFR and PTS just test for Part 91 proficiency?
 
To what degree of proficiency? If I haven't flown in a few weeks I can tell I am not on the top of my game, but I still consider myself proficient.
 
I'd say 100hrs a year.

Honestly that's only 8hrs a month!!

I do that much in 2 1/2 days
 
EdFred said:
Depends on the pilot. Some people lose their skills quickly. Some don't.
Click to expand...

This. I took 2 years and 65 hours to get my PP-ASEL. Partly money and partly life. I do know that my instructor was continuously surprised when I'd have to take a month off between weather and my schedule and I hadn't regressed. He commented on it numerous times. In that same vein, over the holidays last year and the beginning of this year I took 3 months off. At my wife's suggestion, I called my CFI to come for the first flight. After 2 trips round the pattern he said let's try some more interesting things. And proceeded to give me engine outs on crosswind, quick 1/2 patterns to the crossing runway with a fairly stiff crosswind, etc. After 7 landings he said "I'm wasting your money. How do you manage to stay proficient?"

It's something I was born with. I learn songs in 1-2 hearings. I read new material once and consistently score 95%-98% comprehension. And, after several years of off & on flying, I can stay (VFR-day) proficient with minimal flying time or even multiple month layoffs.

My boss, who was also learning to fly, took a week off and regressed a good bit. He took a month off and after that flight he quit. He scared himself (with a CFI along) and said "If I can't fly enough to be safe I won't fly at all." He is very smart man, and also wise.

There is no one-size-fits-all.

John
 
Life insurance companies like to see 100+ hours PIC and anywhere between minimum 35-50 hours per year.

After you start exceeding 150-250 per year they don't want you anymore; your increased exposure outweighs your risk reduction.

Since these people are trained actuaries, I tend to agree.

Could you do it with 25? Perhaps. You'd be doing nothing but pattern and emergency practice work with no passengers to do so. I'm sure 2 hours per month (24 year) with a CFI would be more safe than 50 per year getting hamburgers.
 
It depends on the talent. I'm really struggling to keep nose above water on 80 hours a year. If I slide to 50, 20 will be dual. This catches up very quickly. Pretty soon you do nothing but restore currency and have no money for $100 burgers.
 
pj500 said:
Life insurance companies like to see 100+ hours PIC and anywhere between minimum 35-50 hours per year.

After you start exceeding 150-250 per year they don't want you anymore; your increased exposure outweighs your risk reduction.

Since these people are trained actuaries, I tend to agree.

Could you do it with 25? Perhaps. You'd be doing nothing but pattern and emergency practice work with no passengers to do so. I'm sure 2 hours per month (24 year) with a CFI would be more safe than 50 per year getting hamburgers.
Click to expand...

What? So they want 100 PIC total, but don't want you to fly more than 150-250hrs a year? Really? I get that the more often you fly the greater your chances are to flub up, but I also believe that the more often you fly and don't kill yourself the less likely you'll be to kill yourself in the longer term.


On that note I fly about 200 hours a year. I'd guess I'd need about 50 to stay VFR proficient. 75 to stay IFR system proficient and 100 a year to actually go out in actual and fly.
 
After the Asiana VFR CFIT and the SWA wheelbarrow landing, it appears any number under 1000 apparently isn't enough for some.

Cheers
 
I think the answer depends not only on the pilot but also on the level of experience that pilot has and most importantly what is done during those hours in the air (and on the ground) to maintain their skills.

A newly minted pilot who makes 20 flights between the same two airports each year and thinks spending one hour in a FR every couple years isn't going to be nearly as proficient as one who has several hundred hours in their logbook and spends half their flight time practicing landings and maneuvers (with a CFI along occasionally).
 
Z06_Mir said:
Really? I get that the more often you fly the greater your chances are to flub up, but I also believe that the more often you fly and don't kill yourself the less likely you'll be to kill yourself in the longer term.
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That's incorrect. It's true that your likelihood of killing yourself will be lower per hour of flying. But as pj explained, that improvement per hour is eventually overcome by the increased number of hours.

For example, suppose you increase your flying from 50 hours/year to 500 hours/year. Even if you thereby reduce your hourly fatality risk by as much as 80%, you've still doubled your yearly fatality risk.
 
X3 Skier said:
After the Asiana VFR CFIT and the SWA wheelbarrow landing, it appears any number under 1000 apparently isn't enough for some.

Cheers
Click to expand...

Toss in the Air France and I was thinking the exact same thing.

I was out of aviation for 16 years. Got behind the yoke of an AA5 and the instructor couldn't believe I hadn't flown in so long. Made a greaser at Denton and he had me go around and prove I could do it again. Did it, and he was ready to sign my BFR that evening.

Others, might fly 200/year and are barely able to keep the plane upright.
 
acrophile said:
For example, suppose you increase your flying from 50 hours/year to 500 hours/year. Even if you thereby reduce your hourly fatality risk by as much as 80%, you've still doubled your yearly fatality risk.
Click to expand...

I discussed the subject of "undesirable occurences" with one of the older CFIs, 30+k hours, 40+ years doing it. He has three accidents on his record - one was a flat out broken landing gear on a 172RG where one of the mains wouldn't come out - damage from the landing was sufficient to classify it as an accident.
Second - came in to land at a grass strip, people on the ground were pulling a glider out to launch, figured he'd land past it, then figured there's not enough room and went around, hit the fence at the end of the runway with the mains doing so, ok landing afterwards but enough gear damage to be considered an accident.
Third one - friend's student asked for a "second opinion" day before his Commercial checkride, this CFI flew with the student before and knew that the performance was good and wasn't expecting any surprises. In a power-off 180 the student abruptly pulled the yoke and stalled the Arrow about 10 feet above the runway, hard "arrival" caused the gear struts to go through the wings.

#1 was a one off "happens" deal, #2 and #3 were back to back pretty much. His opinion on the subject - complacency.

My point is, at some point of having more flight hours a year, you get complacent and screw up. Not saying "don't fly as much as you can" but rather "remember that you are getting complacent and fight it"
 
moonshine said:
My point is, at some point of having more flight hours a year, you get complacent and screw up. Not saying "don't fly as much as you can" but rather "remember that you are getting complacent and fight it"
Click to expand...

Aviation folklore has long proposed that complacency is what explains the observed increase in the yearly accident rate for very experienced pilots. The problem with this folklore is that:
  1. There's no evidence that experienced pilots are in fact more complacent, on average, than less experienced pilots.
  2. There's no evidence that experienced pilots have a higher accident rate per flight hour than less experienced pilots.
  3. Being very experienced correlates with flying often, and simple arithmetic shows that pilots who fly very often will have a higher accident rate per year even if their hourly accident rate is lower and even if they're less complacent than other pilots.
Fighting complacency is a good idea for every pilot, novice or expert. But complacency has no plausible relevance to the actuarial observation about experienced pilots' accident rate.
 
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