FAA Line Check Record!

derg

derg

Apparently a "terse" writer
Staff member
We got a routing line check from the FAA this morning. It wasn't a Air Safety Inspector, it was an Air Carrier Inspector -- one of the ones that actually know what they're looking at when you fly the airplane.

Holy cow, a 3 hr, 20 min block time, didn't talk much, didn't nod off once and just stared straight ahead. Just a couple of questions about how the -90 differs from the -88 (he flew -9's for a while) and that's about it.

That's got to be my personal record as most of them take shorter legs to check the crews or at least get the 'head bob' at least once after an hour or so!

Wow!
 
Man...My best friends dad is an inspector. Everytime I go to thier house its like the oral half of a checkride all over again......I'm half afraid he's gonna ask to see my license/logbook when I go to say hi!
 
Texasspilot said:
Man...My best friends dad is an inspector. Everytime I go to thier house its like the oral half of a checkride all over again......I'm half afraid he's gonna ask to see my license/logbook when I go to say hi!
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Haha, you should walk in with your logbook open and your license in the other hand.
 
What I gotta know is, did he want to see your flashlight? I've been feeling guilty for carry around this little, two AA cell, flashlight. It's very compact and light but I wonder what a fed would say.

Did he look to see if your jepps revisions were up to date?

I've had three or four ramp checks since I've been at UPS but can't remember an actual, in flight, fed ride. Just having a check airman on board is enough to keep you on the straight and narrow.

If I was 59.5 years old, I'd love to see the look on a feds face if you got up to cruise altitude, pulled out the USA TODAY, and asked him if he would like to see the sports page. Oh Gawd. My wet dream.....
 
DE727UPS said:
If I was 59.5 years old, I'd love to see the look on a feds face if you got up to cruise altitude, pulled out the USA TODAY, and asked him if he would like to see the sports page. Oh Gawd. My wet dream.....
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I think I would wait until I was at least 59 and 364/365ths to pull that one! LOL! ;)

Bob
 
Hah reminds me of when we were getting route checked by the feds a few months ago. It was my first time dealing with the feds outside the FSDO ever and I was pretty nervous about it when we picked him up at one of our outstations unannounced. What also made it worse was that it was the first time the captain and I had flown together, we were doing some real short legs where alot of non standard procedures are used apparently because its so short(all briefed by the captain before hand though) and the outstation didn't give us the usual heads up on the feds being there.

Anyways we didn't get a chance to talk about what to expect but we kept it by the book and things went ok. Then on our return trip to Den, which was about 75 minutes or so the captain busts out a playboy and starts unfolding the centerolds while making some stupid looking faces to see if he can get me to crack up. This is on the B1900D btw, so for those who haven't been on one, the fed sits in seat 1A since we don't have an actual jumpseat. They can still plug a headset into a jack and listen to our conversations and all that but they can't see what the captain is doing, only the FO. Anyways, I somehow keep it together, or atleast it was unnoticable and the inspector just gave us a good job when he hopped off in DEN.
 
"I think I would wait until I was at least 59 and 364/365ths to pull that one"

We have a better A plan.....
 
"the captain busts out a playboy and starts unfolding the centerolds while making some stupid looking faces to see if he can get me to crack up"

You gotta be kidding me. You don't work for Great Lakes do you?
 
We used to get checked between IAD and BOS all the time. I read the paper at cruise. Show me where it says you can't do that???

Heck the inspector would ask for the sports section half the time!
 
Mr_Creepy said:
We used to get checked between IAD and BOS all the time. I read the paper at cruise. Show me where it says you can't do that???

Heck the inspector would ask for the sports section half the time!
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In alot of airlines OpsManual.
 
Mr_Creepy said:
We used to get checked between IAD and BOS all the time. I read the paper at cruise. Show me where it says you can't do that???

Heck the inspector would ask for the sports section half the time!
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Most airline's FOM section usually worded like "non-essential reading materials" or something like that.

Bust the FOM and/or OPS SPECS of your company and it's just as bad as violating an FAR!

"Hello? ALPA? Yeah, I received a letter of correction from the FAA after breaking out the Financial Times enroute during a route check... Hello? I'm not kidding!" :)
 
DE727UPS said:
"the captain busts out a playboy and starts unfolding the centerolds while making some stupid looking faces to see if he can get me to crack up"

You gotta be kidding me. You don't work for Great Lakes do you?
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Nope not kidding about the playboy and yep i'm at Lakes. The Captain didn't actually keep it out and read it or anything. Just pulled it out for a bit to get me to relax a bit since it was my first route check by the feds.
 
LOL I had to go back and pull out all my old Ops Specs and check.

Midway had a line about it but it says "during critical phases of flight."

That's the only one. Mesa, Eagle, Air Midwest, CC Air - nothing!

Must be a new movement to further restrict pilot freedom in the cockpit. One good fall out from 9-11 is that no one is insisting on cockpit video cameras any more are they?
 
Mr_Creepy said:
Must be a new movement to further restrict pilot freedom in the cockpit. One good fall out from 9-11 is that no one is insisting on cockpit video cameras any more are they?
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According to my latest AWST, cockpit video is one of the NTSB's 5 most wanted for aviation.
 
I'll have to bust out my GOM, but I've never heard of "no reading at cruise." Heck, all of my IOE has been done with newspapers, et al. If a Fed has a problem with me reading so that I can stay awake and alert ... then I'm off to Truckmasters.

Of course, if there isn't enough oxygen to take a jumpseater, and we'd be looking at a delay to get 02, well then my duty is to my passengers, not the Fed. :)
 
Doug Taylor said:
Most airline's FOM section usually worded like "non-essential reading materials" or something like that.

Bust the FOM and/or OPS SPECS of your company and it's just as bad as violating an FAR!

"Hello? ALPA? Yeah, I received a letter of correction from the FAA after breaking out the Financial Times enroute during a route check... Hello? I'm not kidding!" :)
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"non-essential"?

I believe the policy of US Airways was that it just had to be at least aviation related/educational. Not aviation related as in an AOPA magazine, but if it helped you gain more knowledge of the flight it was OK. You could pull out an advanced aviation weather book and start calculating various things based on the lapse rate you observed. Not that you would do this, but the policy seems less strict than one using the words "non-essential".
 
Ours says something about "not related to safety of flight", but it's because a freakin' FA once took a photo through the peephole of both pilots reading the paper and posted it on his f-ing website. Jackass.
 
jdflight said:
Ours says something about "not related to safety of flight", but it's because a freakin' FA once took a photo through the peephole of both pilots reading the paper and posted it on his f-ing website. Jackass.
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...Another use for that blasted hat dohickey
 
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