If you didn’t attend Modaero Festival 2016, make plans for next year. It was a lot of fun.
Category Archives: aircraft training
Aircraft annuals and the insurance company
Thinking of flying your freshly “out of annual” aircraft to the mechanic for the annual? Check your insurance coverage first! Many insurance companies will not provide coverage for the aircraft if it is not in a current airworthiness status.
But wait! It is licensed; it does have a current airworthiness…well not quite! If the aircraft is out of annual and the owner gets a ferry permit, some people feel that makes it legal to fly. Sort of. Yes it is legal, by the FAA, to fly under the restricted permit. All you have to do is follow the rules.
BUT…the insurance company doesn’t always agree. You could have the correct paperwork in the aircraft, the approved pilot and still not be covered. The insurance policy often has a clause that will not provide coverage for the aircraft if it is not within current airworthiness. In many peoples opinion this is a gray area of the airworthiness. Airworthy means different things to the insurance company than to the pilot.
What can you do? Call the agent and get a little information. Ask a few questions. Check to see if the policy has any language about FAR’s. Many companies have an exclusion in the policy that will not provide any coverage for any situation where the insured is found in non-compliance with the FAR’s. We have found a few companies that don’t have any language pertaining to FAR’s (but they do have language that excludes out of annual aircraft).
With an aircraft that runs out of annual during a trip (poor planning for whatever reason) the coverage will probably be null and void. Don’t put yourself into this type of situation. The aircraft needs to have a ferry permit issued by the appropriate FAA Flight Standards District Office. To do that requires that the aircraft have an entry in the logbooks from a mechanic stating that the aircraft is airworthy for a ferry flight. Most of the time this means it does not have any outstanding AD’s that could jeopardize the flight, the flight has to be “Day VFR” and that only the required crew be on board. In that situation having your friend fly along is not required. Getting dual in the aircraft because you have never flown it before might be required for you, but not for the operation of the aircraft.
If you want to fly and be insured with an aircraft that is out of annual the underwriter can put a note in the insurance company file and you’ll be okay. Don’t be surprised if they charge you extra for this little bit of service. If the aircraft has been out of annual for a long time, say over a month; make sure that you have a good relationship with the agent and the underwriter. It might take a little work for the agent to get the underwriter to provide coverage. Underwriters don’t like to cover aircraft that have been out of annual for a long time. The risk is too high for failure and claims.
If you bought an aircraft that was out of annual, you might not be able to get coverage at all. Many insurance companies have decided that they will not take on a new risk that is not ready to fly. That means the aircraft might be a good deal as is, out of annual, but you can’t bring it home insured. If you want to buy an aircraft in this situation, call the agent first and let him know what the situation is. We have been able to get coverage in a limited number of cases provided the aircraft has not been out of annual very long and the pilot was qualified to fly the aircraft.
Whatever the situation, make sure you check you policy before you fly an aircraft that is out of annual… or hundred hour inspection, but that’s a different story.
Simulator or stimulator
I’ve always felt that flying was very stimulating. I think that most pilots feel the same way. It brings out another side to the personality that a pilot craves. And one way to fulfill that desire is to use a PC Simulator. One of the simulator programs that I have is the Microsoft Flight Simulator Professional. I know there are other systems, but I have had this for years and it has always worked great.
This version offers me a chance to actually download weather from the Internet and overlay it in the simulation I’m in. Another neat thing is that I can use the simulator program to pick a city and plan a cross country flight, before I make the flight. And many times the airport in the simulation has many of the topographical things to give me a perspective of the area. No, it is not the same as being there. But I’m not there! I’m pretending to be there. And that makes it fun. I can pretend to be almost anywhere. And I can fly aircraft I don’t own or can’t fly in real life. My desire has never been to fly an airline, but I can, on the simulator.
And if I want, I can make the flight, shoot a couple of approaches (and I’m not even instrument rated) and be prepared for the trip. It’s a rehearsal for the actual flight. And the old line “practice makes perfect” has never been more accurate than in aviation. The more you fly the better it is. And that doesn’t mean just flying in an aircraft.
Want more? There are lots of extras in today’s flight simulators such as real time weather, lots of cool visual effects and quite an assortment of airplanes. One of which is my dream aircraft, the Cessna Caravan on amphibious floats. I have always felt that the Caravan on amphib’s could replace a fifth wheel travel trailer, a testosterone filled truck and my airplane.
And when it came time to refuel…I shut the program off and didn’t have to worry about paying for the hundreds of gallons of fuel that I burned during the flight. My Discover card thanked me. Kind of a nice thought.