Commercial Rating Question

[centralhome]

This may be a stupid question, but here it goes. Under the requirements it says a cross country of at least 300 miles with one leg being 250 miles. Unless you are leaving the plane somewhere, wouldn't it have to be at least 500 miles since you have to go at least 250 miles on one leg?
And for the night cross country can you use you're IFR long cross country if it was done at night? Or can you use it since some of it was simulated instrument?

Thanks

[mhcasey]

Originally Posted by centralhome

This may be a stupid question, but here it goes. Under the requirements it says a cross country of at least 300 miles with one leg being 250 miles. Unless you are leaving the plane somewhere, wouldn't it have to be at least 500 miles since you have to go at least 250 miles on one leg?

Yes.

And for the night cross country can you use you're IFR long cross country if it was done at night? Or can you use it since some of it was simulated instrument?

Thanks

The regs just say "in VFR conditions," so a straight reading would imply that as long as you logged 0 actual time on the IFR XC, it can count. However, I called my local FSDO (which probably disagrees with every other FSDO) and they specified two things...

"The whole reason it says 'in VFR conditions' is so you'll use pilotage and dead reckoning as your primary source of navigation, which you could not do on a simulated IFR trip.

Furthermore, training for one rating does not necessarily count towards a further rating. You also could not use your private pilot solo xc's towards this requirement."

I just played it safe and made another XC.

[MidlifeFlyer]

Originally Posted by centralhome

This may be a stupid question, but here it goes. Under the requirements it says a cross country of at least 300 miles with one leg being 250 miles. Unless you are leaving the plane somewhere, wouldn't it have to be at least 500 miles since you have to go at least 250 miles on one leg?

You could do a 1-way qualifying cross country without having to leave the airplane there. How about an Angel or Lifeline flight where you are solo in one direction and have a passenger in the other? There are probably plenty of other examples.

And for the night cross country can you use you're IFR long cross country if it was done at night? Or can you use it since some of it was simulated instrument?

There are elements within the FAA that have interpreted the "VFR" in the commercial dual to mean not only "visual flight rules" but "visual flight" so a flight with anything more than incidental hood work (if even that) would not qualify. BTW, if you look the FAA's proposed revisions to Part 61, you would see, that this is one of the things that the FAA is changing - specifially allowing the commercial cross country duals to be VFR or IFR.

[cfii2007]

I believe it must also be a solo cross country........

[MikeOH58]

The 300 NM one is solo and the 100nm 2 hour day/night are dual.

[cfii2007]

Yes..................