New FAA Handbooks Release Dates

In a recent announcement to the public, the FAA released the proposed release dates of several handbooks. For this year, there aren’t any releases that would apply to airplane CFIs. However, next year, in 2024, there will be two handbooks that will be revised and released in June 2024.

Those are:

The Instrument flying handbook

The Pilot’s Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge

I’m unaware of the content changes, just that new handbooks will be released.

Major Takeaways from the FSANA Conference - March 2023

CFI Bootcamp attended and exhibited at the Flight School Association of North America conference on March 1-3 in Orlando, FL.  We got a lot of interest from schools that want to have our program in their school. More later on that.

FAA had a good presence and made several presentations. Here are the key points of each presentation.

Everett Roshon - Manager of AFS-600 - Airman certification and testing.

1. They are planning to remove flight instructor expiration dates from certificates. Instead, instructors will meet the new recency of experience requirements or complete a FIRC to keep their certificate valid. They are projected to start at the end of this year.

2. They are expanding the definition of Light Sport Aircraft under the Modernization of Special Airworthiness Certification (MOSAIC) program. This is because they are not certificated under Part 23, so they have a special airworthiness certificate. They think this will happen late this year.

3. Improvement of Part 141 regulations.  These regulations haven’t been touched in a long time; some are convoluted and confusing.

4. FAA is also looking into electronic pilot certificates to replace plastic cards.

Katie Samples - Assistant Manager of AFS-650 - Designee Standardization.

1. There are currently 953 DPEs. Of around 60,000 practical tests last year, 150 DPEs did approximately 40,000. Approximately 25% of DPEs do less than 25 tests a year.

2. The message is that we need the current low-activity DPEs to do more tests.

3. Also, they want to bring DPE supervision into AFS-650 rather than the FSDOs. 

Airman Training and Testing Committee Meeting

Jason Blair led our Committee meeting on Airman Testing. The main points were:

1. PSIs decision to cut the fee schools get to give a test by 2/3rds. There is no competition. PSI is the only provider.

2. PSI was also the only bidder for the contract.

3. The belief is that PSI wants to give all FAA tests in their locations rather than using flight schools.

4. 25% of applicants for checkrides are not eligible for the test. Missing or incorrect endorsements, missing aeronautical experience, and unairworthy airplanes were cited. This consumes two test slots.

Pro Tips for this month

1. Use a home computer simulator to practice procedures. It helps. If you can, invest in the most realistic controls possible. Consider Redbirds controls.

2. When you near the round out point in your landing, move your eyes from the cowling to about 1/3 down the runway, back and forth. This helps with depth perception and detecting the rate of descent.

3. Develop the feel for aircraft coordination. Stop looking at the ball. If you look at the ball to see what to do, you already have an uncoordinated airplane. For normal flying, unless you are slipping, doing a crosswind takeoff, or landing, you must be straight up in your seat with no sloshing left or right. You should be the steel rod that doesn’t lean at all. Cover up the ball and learn to sense this sloshing movement.

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