What Really.... Is Cross Country Time. Options

[BMeister]

Question: Reference CFI Oral Exam guide Fift Edition ASA

[What requirements must be met before a flight instructor can allow a student pilot to make repeated specific solo cross-country flights without each flight being logbook endorsed]

Repeated specific solo -cross country flights ma be made to another airport within 50NM of the airport from which the flight orginated, provided:


So I'm puzzled though in this case, are they saying anything ' WITHIN ' 50NM is a cross country flight???

What is the NM'age of a Cross country flight?

61.1 states a xc is 50nm
61.1 ( b) (3)( i) only talks about what it takes to be a xc
61.1 (b ) (3) (ii) states you must fly 50nm

But...to log the xc time towards a certificate

so a student can fly more than 25nm and consider it xc time.... BUT to log it towards a certificate they have to fly atleast 50nm.


.. and that is where the technicallity that as an instructor or commercial pilot you can log anything over 25nm as xc time... cause your not logging it towards a certificate

am I getting this correctly??

Im trying to figure out this endorsement for a pilot to fly to an airport within 50NM without making multiple cross country endrosements for that flight, but they state Cross country within 50NM so Im confused


Your opinions and views on this would be helpful :D

61.1

" (3) Cross-country time means--
[(i) Except as provided in paragraphs (b)(3)(ii) through (b)(3)(vi) of this section, time acquired during a flight--]
(A) Conducted by a person who holds a pilot certificate;
(B) Conducted in an aircraft;
© That includes a landing at a point other than the point of departure; and
(D) That involves the use of dead reckoning, pilotage, electronic navigation aids, radio aids, or other navigation systems to navigate to the landing point."


You can log it however you want I guess. Many people don't log <50 nm as XC, but that's simply because it avoids having to recalculate if you're going for a rating. Once you have 500+ XC it really doesn't matter. It's still XC time if you land at another airport, and you can log it as such

[Becky_KSTS]

I am a GA pilot. If you are shooting to get your PPL then here is my two cents: I had to fly two cross country solos: both exceeded the 50 nm miles to my first airport to satisfy one of the requirements for my private pilots license. How I found my way back was my choice.

After you get your license (at lease where I live) any time that you land at another airport you may log it as as a cross country flight. I struggle with one when I land only 10 nm away from my airport. I decided not to log it as cross county.

If you are going for more ratings? The rules change. A professional airline pilot can take it from here.....

[BMeister]

I am a GA pilot. If you are shooting to get your PPL then here is my two cents: I had to fly two cross country solos: both exceeded the 50 nm miles to my first airport to satisfy one of the requirements for my private pilots license. How I found my way back was my choice.

After you get your license (at lease where I live) any time that you land at another airport you may log it as as a cross country flight. I struggle with one when I land only 10 nm away from my airport. I decided not to log it as cross county.

If you are going for more ratings? The rules change. A professional airline pilot can take it from here.....

Thank you for your two cents Bex

It was nice of you to state the obvious but I didn't need it to be explaned as if I was a student Pilot though, I need help defining it indepth for my Flight Instructor Checkride

[Harmattan96]

Bmeister
The more questions you ask the more I am thinking you'll make a fine instructor.

Starting from the get go, let me put your mind at ease and point you in the direction of definitions. The term cross country is a vast one depending on what it is we are discussing, in your case it is very specific.
Regardless of what is it that we are discussing the definition,accepted worlwide, of a cross country is taking the aircraft out of an airport and repositioning it at another airport. regardless of distance.
Yet as you pointed out if we are looking at acquiring ratings and certificates 14 CFR 61.1 will define what exactly is a cross country so that it is meaningfull in its experience and truthfully claims to have imprinted knowledge into the airman claiming such experience.
For most certificates that would be the 50 nm point which is designed so that with a light training aircraft, upon reaching altitude, you cannot see the arrival, hence you will need to use and demonstrate a minimum knowledge in navigation (whatever that method might be).
Yet, as a flight instructor you are offered to endorse a student for repeated cross countries which are less than 50 nm in length. So your question as I understand it would really be what is, if any the purpose of such flight?

Here is your answer:
Some flight schools, determine that students cannot proceed with repeated touch and goes at the home base airports. This reasoning could be a resultant of noise abatement, high heavy traffic, etcetera. If that student is to go practice his skills solo, an endorsement might be necessary for him to go beyond 25nm , but less than 50nm, to an airport which offers no noise abatement, and lighter traffic. That actuallly was the case at the last flight school at which I worked. So the regulations provide you with a loophole for a student solo pilot to go beyond the realm of the 25nm he is initially limited to, providing of course that you have endorsed him.
As far as the requirements for such endorsement they are the same as for any cross country flight endorsement.
One thing to point out here the feds are using the word cross country in its true meaning, the one I gave you earlier: the repositioning of an aircraft from one airport to another, regardless of distance. Alas, we both understand that this student is not going to be logging any X-C time on this flight!