EdFred
Taxi to Parking
I generally toss anything I get in the mailbox onto my dining room table and go through it every couple weeks or so because I do all my bill pay online and I don't normally expect much in the mail besides coupons I'll never use, FAAST stuff I won't attend, notices from ERAU and PanAm saying I can be a CFI there and eighteen bazillion credit card offers. Was a good thing I checked a couple weeks ago, I almost tossed my new Discover card, and a check from my bank for a loan overpayment, well I also found something in the pile from the FAA. I thought it was for an AD on the Cherokee I no longer have, and almost tossed that as well, but decided to open it.
After making a few calls over the past week and a half between myself and my lawyer and OKC and the DPE who did my private/IR/and comm ride and a meeting with FSDO it turns out I have some issues coming up here shortly. Could have been worse I suppose, but kind of screws my dad over.
It appears that my CFI who signed me off (I was the only student he ever signed off) got the microscope put on him for something else, and they started looking at everything of his, and of course I'm in his logbook, and here's where the problem for me (and now unfortunately my dad) begins. The last entries in his logbook (and mine) show the last flight he and I had together as 11/8/02 for 1.7 hours. There's also an 11/4/02 for 1.1 hours, and then 10/23/02 showing (two flights for a total of) 2.2 hours. He signed me off for the checkride on the 8th of November and I attempted to take the check ride later that month. I did the oral, but weather kept me from doing the flight portion. So, finally on January 8th, 2003 I took the flight portion and passed the ride, and got my private. But here's the issue: The FAA has no record of my letter of discontinuance! So, as far as the OKC is concerned I did not have 3 hours of training within 60 days of the check ride. The DPE says he did file the dicontinuance with the FAA, but they said they didn't get it, so it's like it never happened. Long story short, my private certificate was never valid! The non-existant private means I don't have my IR, my commercial, and here's where my dad gets screwed: No CFI. I had to surrender all of my all my certificates to the FSDO today at 11:00am. And OKC has cancelled processing my dad's certificate as well.
The only upside of this is they are not going violate me for over 550 hours of various flying without a student license, pilot certificate, under IFR without a rating, carrying passengers, etc. I can thank my lawyer for that bit of negotiation. He also was able to get them to allow all my hours that were solo, and all my training hours over the past 5 years, but I have to get the 3 hours of training for each ride, take all my writtens again, and all my check rides again if I want to continue, well actually I guess it's not continue since I never was, being a pilot.
And thanks to AdamZ for putting me in touch with my lawyer who was a savior for getting the Feds to lay off the violations.
So, after spending a huge chunk of money fighting this, I have to decide whether or not it is worth it to do it all over again. The airport manager/DPE at Hastings/Allegan is going to do all my dad's training for free, so he doesn't have to wait for me to make up my mind if I decide to go get my CFI again.
After making a few calls over the past week and a half between myself and my lawyer and OKC and the DPE who did my private/IR/and comm ride and a meeting with FSDO it turns out I have some issues coming up here shortly. Could have been worse I suppose, but kind of screws my dad over.
It appears that my CFI who signed me off (I was the only student he ever signed off) got the microscope put on him for something else, and they started looking at everything of his, and of course I'm in his logbook, and here's where the problem for me (and now unfortunately my dad) begins. The last entries in his logbook (and mine) show the last flight he and I had together as 11/8/02 for 1.7 hours. There's also an 11/4/02 for 1.1 hours, and then 10/23/02 showing (two flights for a total of) 2.2 hours. He signed me off for the checkride on the 8th of November and I attempted to take the check ride later that month. I did the oral, but weather kept me from doing the flight portion. So, finally on January 8th, 2003 I took the flight portion and passed the ride, and got my private. But here's the issue: The FAA has no record of my letter of discontinuance! So, as far as the OKC is concerned I did not have 3 hours of training within 60 days of the check ride. The DPE says he did file the dicontinuance with the FAA, but they said they didn't get it, so it's like it never happened. Long story short, my private certificate was never valid! The non-existant private means I don't have my IR, my commercial, and here's where my dad gets screwed: No CFI. I had to surrender all of my all my certificates to the FSDO today at 11:00am. And OKC has cancelled processing my dad's certificate as well.
The only upside of this is they are not going violate me for over 550 hours of various flying without a student license, pilot certificate, under IFR without a rating, carrying passengers, etc. I can thank my lawyer for that bit of negotiation. He also was able to get them to allow all my hours that were solo, and all my training hours over the past 5 years, but I have to get the 3 hours of training for each ride, take all my writtens again, and all my check rides again if I want to continue, well actually I guess it's not continue since I never was, being a pilot.
And thanks to AdamZ for putting me in touch with my lawyer who was a savior for getting the Feds to lay off the violations.
So, after spending a huge chunk of money fighting this, I have to decide whether or not it is worth it to do it all over again. The airport manager/DPE at Hastings/Allegan is going to do all my dad's training for free, so he doesn't have to wait for me to make up my mind if I decide to go get my CFI again.
