Hi there,

I recently introduced myself as "old Fokker 50" pilot, and have a question. I would like to get back up in the air again as soon as possible, take the family for a small cross country, VFR, daytime, private. I have around 4000 hours total experience, have held an Irish (JAR) ATPL and have not flown for almost 10 years.

To satisfy the theoretical component, can I go straight to a PPL exam or would I need to do the RPL (and Nav?) exam first, then PPL? I imagine once the exam is done, to then look up a flight school for some training and a test with an examiner.

Any advice is much appreciated.

Happy landings:)

Brett

A PPL exam should be all that is required, but I would recommend that you find yourself a flying school that appeals and then have a talk to the CFI about planning your training schedule.

Thank you Bob, much appreciated:)

I asked this question to casa a month back and got this answer, you cant sit the practical PPL flight test unless you have passed both (unless you find a flying school which will give you a pass for a bak based on your prior experience):

CASA response:
To gain your PPL(A) licence, you need to pass:

· either a BAK(A) exams (which is conducted by your flying school) OR the CASA exam called RPLA; and
· CASA’s PPLA theory exam.

The order in which you pass the exams for your PPL(A) licence is not critical, i.e. you might actually pass the PPLA exam first and later pass BAK(A)/RPLA, but both do need to be passed.

Nick

I would have thought that if you already have an overseas licence you would not need to sit RPL. But if that is what CASA has told you, it looks like you will need to have passed either the CASA RPL exam or the equivalent exam set by your flying school.

Probably worth calling casa with your exact situation they seemed really helpful when i contacted them, could be differences for different overseas licence eg. currency etc