Logging actual IMC as a student?

Nathan Miller

Nathan Miller

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Nathan
New instrument student with a question to which I'm fairly sure I know the answer. I was looking at the wx today - MVFR in some places, IFR in others. (Oh, how I long for my rating.) I have a partner in my plane (John) who is starting on his IFR ground school in the next month or two. He has volunteered to be my safety pilot once things settle out in the post-pandemic world.

11 or so years ago, I was getting a checkout in a 182. The school's insurance required 10 hours of dual. Knowing I was, one day, going to pursue my IFR ticket, the instructor suggested we kill 2 birds with one stone. Long story short, during the checkout process, I logged about 3 hours of actual IMC.

Here's the scenario I'm curious about -
Once I get my IFR rating and John is embarking on his IFR flight training, can we fly in IMC and
-I act as PIC, having final authority for the safe outcome of the flight
-John, being the sole manipulator of the controls, log PIC time in actual conditions?

I know I have a few things working against me.
1) Technically, my role is Safety Pilot and such flights need to be in VMC.
2) I'm not a CFII (or CFI for that matter).

Spit-balling here during the pandemic to spur on a discussion. I could delve into the FAR and find the answers, but why not discuss amongst ourselves? :)
 
I believe he can only log IF flying with a CFII. But like most cases, I could be wrong
 
Technically, in IMC you wouldn’t be a safety pilot, as none would be required. But yes, you could both log it as you suggested.

Having said that, I strongly suggest not “acting as safety pilot” in IMC for a non-instrument rated pilot as a non-CFI...that’s just asking for trouble in too many areas.
 
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That article covers my exact scenario I had in mind. I guess people other than me also cook up hair brained schemes all the time :rolleyes:

Thanks for the replies!
 
Being PIC is not a necessary nor sufficient condition to log PIC. I don't know how many times we have to say that.

Actual IMC is not a determining factor in whether you need a safety pilot either. A safety pilot is required if the pilot who is flying is using a view-limiting device.

A CFII is only required to log instrument INSTRUCTION. That being said, it's generally regarded as a bad idea for students who are not instrument trained to rack up a lot of "pseudo training time" by someone who is not an instrument instructor. Too easy to get stuck with bad habits.
 
This came up with me during my IFR training. Club members got into a tizzy about it and I had to produce this interpretation.
My safety pilot is a club member who flies a lot of IFR/IMC in that plane and much faster as well. we just went up to do some work to maintain currency. I get a lot of crap about my radio work lol.
 
Very interesting. Would not have thought this was legal. But it is...

As a CFII maybe I should send my students out to do this....

;)
 
Hunt-man said:
Very interesting. Would not have thought this was legal. But it is...

As a CFII maybe I should send my students out to do this....

;)
Click to expand...
It's all about the same thing as 90%+ of all logging questions.

Authority for a pilot to log follows different rules than authority for a pilot to take on a crewmember role.
 
Sole manipulator and rated in category and class?

Are you flying with reference to instruments only as the sole manipulator and rated in category and class?

There's a difference to logging verse acting asoas pic...
 
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