Imagine you are flying a business jet for a medium-sized charter operator. And it’s around 2005. You and your fellow pilot typically fly all over the U.S. and must carry a full set of Jeppesen paper charts in a bag custom made to fit 40 pounds of bulging binders.
One day, your principal operations inspector at the local FAA FSDO calls your chief pilot and says you can't fly until you comply with a new advisory circular (AC) that was a result of an FAA order clarifying the regulations governing all the information you are required to have before every flight. The AC—Paper Charting Implementation and Inflight Usage— recommends the following: that you always carry backup charts; that your chart holder must meet minimum standards for g-loading, not covering up instruments, and visibility; training for how to carry and stow the chart bag safely and how to correctly update the charts; a quality control method to ensure that updates are done correctly and ensure that no charts are missing; and a manual describing all these processes, to include a method for revising the manual. Before the operator can implement use of the paper charting AC’s recommendations, the operator will be required to conduct a six-month evaluation period, to include in-flight and simulator evaluations, to ensure that the proposed system is safe. And the system must be included in the operator’s safety management system.
Matt Thurber, editor-in-chief at AIN Media Group, has been flying since 1975 and writing about aviation since 1978 and now has the best job in the world, running editorial operations for Aviation International News, Business Jet Traveler, and FutureFlight.aero. In addition to working as an A&P mechanic on everything from Piper Cubs to turboprops, Matt taught flying at his father’s flight school in Plymouth, Mass., in the early 1980s, flew for an aircraft owner/pilot, and for two summer seasons hunted swordfish near the George’s Banks off the East Coast from a Piper Super Cub. An ATP certificated fixed-wing pilot and CFII and commercial helicopter pilot, Matt is type-rated in the Citation 500 and Gulfstream V/550. Based in the Pacific Northwest, Matt and his team cover the entire aviation scene including business aircraft, helicopters, avionics, safety, manufacturing, charter, fractionals, technology, air transport, advanced air mobility, defense, and other subjects of interest to AIN, BJT, and FutureFlight readers.
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