Sport Pilot Practical Test Standards Released

The FAA released its Practical Test Standards for Sport Pilots this week, and they are posted online. The standards are crucial to flight training. “Flight instructors need to know to what [the standards are] to train their students,” said AOPA spokesman Rob Hackman in a statement yesterday. “Now that the practical test standards are available online, they can easily and quickly refer to them at any time.” The practical test standards for sport pilot airplane, gyroplane, glider, airship, balloon, weight shift control, powered parachute, and flight instructor are available online at the FAA Web site. EAA has posted a sample database of test questions, both for pilots and for instructors. All of these documents could be updated and corrected as the sport pilot program progresses, AOPA said. The weight-shift control and powered parachute standards should be published sometime in January.