Swiss pilot fined for forgetting to enter 17 flights in aircraft logbook

Rwy20 wrote:

Maybe they cast out their net because of this

Sonnig SA is a commercial operation with AOC and multiple jets. Any forum discussion should separate NCO and NCC into different threads as the applicable regulations are different.

I can’t tell if this thread’s subject prosecution is for NCO or NCC, although the impression is left that it concerns a private operator with his own plane. If so, the Sonnig details are not relevant… completely different situation.

Peter wrote:

A part of the issue is that you want to log airborne time for maintenance purposes. And virtually nobody has an instrument which logs that. Obviously it could be done…

With the increasing popularity of things like the Garmin G5 (and I bet the big glass systems do it), this will change.

I turned logging on with my G5 and it logs absolutely everything to the SD card. When I get a bit of time I might write a parser for it and make it available online (it writes a simple CSV file to the SD card, which includes amongst other things, GPS derived time, GPS position, air data (airspeed, pressure altitude, altitude above sea level), QNH setting, rate of climb, angle of bank, angle of pitch, GPS track, GPS groundspeed, number of GPS sats being received etc). From that you can work out quite easily what’s airborne time, at least for fixed wing aircraft.

Peter wrote:

If I wrote that I would be lynched

For everyone else it is ok.

Well, I don’t think for a minute that this is EASA’s fault. Either the CAMO goes over the top or the NAA clings to old practises without any basis in legislation.

If I wrote that I would be lynched

For everyone else it is ok.

WhiskeyPapa wrote:

My CAMO has me submit a report after every flight including tach start and stop, fuel amount, oil level, block time, flight time, departure and destination aerodrome and number of landings.

That’s total madness! Where is the regulatory basis for that? How much of the CAMO charge you pay is spent managing all that information?

Sure, but that won’t solve the issue in my last para here unless the said GPS is mounted in the aircraft

This guy was presumably the sole pilot.

Peter wrote:

A part of the issue is that you want to log airborne time for maintenance purposes. And virtually nobody has an instrument which logs that.

Well, my old Garmin 196 GPS has a function that comes very close. The track log starts recording at 40kts and stops once the speed drops below that. IIRC this threshold can be adjusted. For SEPs that’s pretty damn close to flight time.

Given that the only maintenance cost on my planes that’s associated with tach time is the cost of oil and oil filters, this might save me maybe $10 per year.
The psychatrist needed to sort me out after a year of worry about stuff like that would be a lot more.

Yes but

• this is Europe – you have the CAAs authorising companies (not individuals) and then collecting fees from the companies
• people operating somewhat more upmarket planes typically spend 5k on the Annual, plus some 0.7k on each 50hr service
• a very small % of owners are pro-active and DIY-capable like you
• freelance maintenance is for most practical purposes infeasible in the certified world (for many reasons, starting with airfield politics; for obvious reasons homebuilders are mostly located away from the airfield-political scene)
• only a small % of owners have the facility of a hangar where they can do unrestricted freelance work (due to airfield politics etc)

The last 3 items together would halve maintenance costs, for the same work done.

So there is an incentive to find creative ways to reduce costs. But if you do it by not logging flights you have to do an awful lot of it to make enough of a difference, and then it will be obvious to anyone who checks. Even plane spotter sites (or FR24, for those who need to use Mode S to get somewhere) can expose you.

Out of curiosity – which particular regulation require each of these logs to be kept up to date, and in what manner?