Dual given from rear seat?

Chucco

Well-Known Member
I recently started a new CFI job. I'm really enjoying it, and I'm trying to build my multi PIC time so I can finish my MEI.

The other day I thought I saw something that struck me as odd: A chief pilot at my flight school had a multi-engine training flight scheduled with a student. He also needed to do a 141 checkout on another instructor in this same multi-engine aircraft. This other instructor is an MEI with more than 5hrs PIC in the airplane. What he apparently did was have the MEI in need of a checkout sit right seat, student sit left seat, and he sat in the back! When they returned he signed the MEI's logbook for the 141 checkout, and also signed the student's logbook for the lesson they completed.

Is that legal? Can you log dual given from the back seat if there is a competent pilot sitting right seat (who isn't logging dual given or received)? Must I not have correctly seen what happened?

Now my real question is this: Let's say there is a multi-engine training flight scheduled. Can I sit right seat and log PIC as a safetly pilot while the student is under the hood and the instructor is in the back?

Something sounds very odd here, but I can't find an answer in the FARs. 91.109(a) is the closest reg i found but it only specifies that the airplane must have fully functional dual controls...

Any help? (This must be wrong, free multi PIC sounds way too good to be true...)
 
I don't see why not. He was in fact giving a checkride to the CFI, right? So it really doesn't matter where he sits. Maybe it's a little grey area, but I don't see it as illegal. Logging "pilot" time from the back seat is out of the question, but there shouldn't be a problem with serving as the instructor.
 
:eek::eek::eek: Holy crap! I had no idea that was such a hot topic. I'm not touching that with a 40-foot pole! I'll just assume that the chief pilot was doing a stagecheck or something and not bring it up again.

As far as my MEI is concerned, what's an extra $1000-2000 added on to the thousands that I already am in debt for?

Thanks for the info! Let's see if this turbo Seneca flies any better than the stub-winged Arrow... which was alarmingly similar to a block of masonry! :D
 
I don't see why not. He was in fact giving a checkride to the CFI, right? So it really doesn't matter where he sits. Maybe it's a little grey area, but I don't see it as illegal. Logging "pilot" time from the back seat is out of the question, but there shouldn't be a problem with serving as the instructor.


61.51 allows any time as a flight instructor to be logged as PIC. If you agree that it is legal to instruct from the back seat, you have to agree that it is legal to log PIC.
 
Heres how I see it: As an instructor your job is to train the student. If you are ever in a situation where you think sitting in the back is the best way, then by all means do it. There is no regulation forbidding it, so why restrict yourself from ever doing it? I personally have never done it, but I would never condemn or look down upon someone else for doing it.

On the other hand, if you're only doing it to get more hours, then you're not putting your student's education first, and thats a big no-no. That said, I doubt the FAA would ever know, and even then, what could they do? How could they violate, or otherwise punish you?
 
On the other hand, if you're only doing it to get more hours, then you're not putting your student's education first, and thats a big no-no. That said, I doubt the FAA would ever know, and even then, what could they do? How could they violate, or otherwise punish you?
The FAA would find a way. With some of these multiple logging (and other issues, and not just FAA ones) there is a bit of a smell test. Things that "technically" fit the rule can be found to be a sham.

There's the example of the case of the 2 CFIs who were taking turns giving each other instruction so they could both log PIC and build time.

How did the FAA find out? Routine logbook check after an accident.

What did the FAA do about it? Revoked both pilots certificates and ratings for falsifying their logbooks.

There is a bit more to it. But in "smell test" cases there always is.

http://www.ntsb.gov/alj/O_n_O/docs/AVIATION/4008.PDF
 
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