Licenses vs. Certificates, Aviators vs. Pilots, This vs. That

[Joe LaMantia]

Hal,

Thanks for separating the thread. When I responded to the initial question, all I was trying to do was help define an abr. I really didn't think it would lead to all the hair splitting and lawyer talk. As far as Aviators and Pilots are concerned, we should remember that people took to the air in balloons a good 100 years before the Wrights flew a powered heavier than air machine. I just finished reading a book by Richard Holmes called "Falling Upwards" which covers the history of lighter than air flight from the Montgolfiers of 1783 to the present. The French lead the military use of balloons as well with the "Corps d'Aerostiers" in 1794. Given the nature of free flight ballooning the term pilot or aviator maybe a stretch, but they sure as heck had passion and nerve! What's in a name?

Joe

[Floatsflyer]

PPL is an ICAO/JAA term. When I first heard aviators (aviators or airmen -- or are they air-people now?) in Europe -- England too -- refer to PPL I had no idea what they were talking about. (If you think Americans love acronyms, try dealing with Germans.) After awhile I figured it out without having to 'fess up to my ignorance. ICAO and the JAA use the term "license" and letter codes to describe the ratings (PPL, CPL, MPL, ATPL). Is this usage something slipping over from Canada?

Perhaps it did slip over from Canada...but that's a good thing, eh? But that's so 5 years ago. Five years ago our licensing system underwent a wholesale transformation. We no longer carry licenses or permits. Our PPL's, CPLs, ATPL's, BPLs, GPL's, MCPL's, ATC's, FE's, RPP's, ULP's, GYP's, CRP's and all the other freekin' attendant and related pilot/aircraft type/class abbreviations are now contained in an "Aviation Document". It's the size and look of a passport, has our passport type picture, personal information, medical certificate/+renewals and all manner of security features, lots of room for new licenses and permits and competency records.

And it has to be renewed every 5 years just like a standard passport.....but no charge for that, just the hassle of renewal.

[Mayhemxpc]

Sounds like the German "Annerkennung" (recognition) of my US certificate. Nice quality work, though. I suppose it would be appropriate to have a picture somewhere on ours. (Although, unlike the lucky guy in the previous post I am beginning to look like a heavier version of one of the guys on the back of the certificate I have.)

Aviators, pilots, and airmen. Could it be that what we DO is pilot aircraft. What we ARE are aviators and airmen.

Chris
N424AF

[Floatsflyer]

Aviators, pilots, and airmen. Could it be that what we DO is pilot aircraft. What we ARE are aviators and airmen.

Chris
N424AF

There are those certain occasions when I like to describe myself in the words of Mr. Yeager--A Natural Born Stick and Rudder Man.

[Mayhemxpc]

I thought he said there was no such thing as a born pilot. When asked, I simply say: "I fly."

[Jim Hann]

a certificate calling it a license (technically, "licence.")

And that one letter is why, I was told by an old timer, we don't have pilots' licences in the USA. :-)

[Mayhemxpc]

I looked on a British website for flight instruction and they call it a private pilot License, and as Peter Arnold says, "we (the Brits) invented the language.

That is as it may be, but the aeroplane was invented here.

The Europeans decided that pilots needed to be licensed (that is, given special permission by the State) to take a ship aloft. In America, We the People looked at that and merely issued a certificate stating that an aviator/airman/pilot had demonstrated competency to do so safely. If other governments and international agreements say that our certificates are the equivalent of licenses, that is all well and good…but it doesn't make a certificate a license. (Hal's experience notwithstanding.)

[Eagle Six]

Our US pilot certificates do include the words "to exercise the privileges of". Although that may be considered by some to be a "right", it certainly is not in the context of being recognized by a Constitutional Declaration, no more than driving a car or riding a horse. And, the "privileges" are printed on a government issue identification card. I don't need the "privileges" to fly, but they are helpful if I'm questioned about it!!


Best Regards.....George

[Mayhemxpc]

I never said that it was a right. We are splitting legal hairs about this. By definition license is permission to do something. It does not necessarily imply any specific competence to do so. (e.g., a fishing license.) A certificate means that (on the date of the examination anyway) you demonstrated the prerequisite experience and ability to perform a certain thing to a certain standard. With regard to the regulation of air commerce, a person must demonstrate a specified degree of competence to operate an airplane in which a lack of said competence could pose an undue risk to other people. The full text of your certificate says that you have been found to be properly qualified to exercise the privileges of XXX. Among other privileges, a private pilot has the privilege of carrying other people. A commercial pilot can charge for his or her services. Do you have a RIGHT to fly? Maybe. But laws and regulations limit the exercise of that right to ultralight aircraft, where there is minimal risk or serious bodily harm or significant property loss to anyone other than yourself. No certificate or license required.

As regard to a government issued card…well, these days you need a government issued card just to be a passenger on a plane!

[crusty old aviator]

Years ago, I was told that if you got paid to do it, you were licensed, so your private and instrument were certificates and your commercial and ATP were licenses, and A&P's were licensed, too. It seems this was just a lot of wind, or the FAA decided somewhere along the line to standardize all their forms and we all became airmen numbers, instead of names. Whatever...

As for pilots vs. aviators: it used to be common knowledge that you started out as a student pilot, and once you learned to taxi, take off, and land an airplane without requiring a training wheel under the engine, you became an aviator. I've also heard variations on this theme, like aviators prefer flying off of grass to flying off pavement, steam gauges to glass panels, open cockpits to cabins, doped fabric to aluminum sheet, and avionics and GPS: well, they're just unnecessary weight. Give 'em a handful of charts and a good compass and they'll get there, no matter what the weather. Those who refer to themselves as aviators today are usually wannabee early airmail pilots who choose to ignore the fact that most of the real aviators died from impacting the ground in the middle of snowstorms. The one's who survived are the ones who risked ostracism by bailing out or landing in fields to wait out storms. Aviators were a tough, shell-shocked lot that flew because it was their life, it was all they knew, and the longer they survived, the better they got at it. I flew with a few aviators back in the 70's, so I know the archtype well.
WWII fighter pilots were similar to aviators, but when they weren't getting shot at, they enjoyed amenities like heated, enclosed cockpits, oxygen, radios, and gyros. I've flown with many of them, too, and know that archtype.
By the above definition, bush pilots are the only modern equivalent we have to aviators, though I once heard a trike pilot wax poetic about how he was a true aviator because he was out in the slipstream, at one with the wind, communing with the tree-tops, blah, blah, blah. Balloonists are aeronauts, so we shant go there.
Call yourself whatever you want: at the end of the day, the airport's new neighbors will most likely call you sh*thead when you climbout over their house, at GTOW on a hot day, and they're the people who will try to curtail your aviating, flying, and nuisance-making, no matter what we and our little plastic, FAA-issued cards are called.