When a DPE shows up to do an initial commercial pilot practical test, one of the things that they have to verify the applicant did was fly a qualifying long cross-country flight.

This is one of those requirements where the details count, and if the details weren’t carefully considered, it just might end up being a hard discussion with the applicant and/or their instructor if it wasn’t done correctly.

So, let’s talk about one of those scenarios that could leave the DPE, the applicant, and the CFI on the edge for just a little bit.

Let’s start with what the actual regulation says.

It indicates that a pilot seeking an intial commercial pilot certificate must complete the following requirement:

Note the requirement in this that there must be a point of landing that is at least 250 nautical miles from the original point of departure.

Ok, so, I have seen this go wrong a few ways. One was when the applicant and their instructor had their flight planning app software set to STATUTE miles instead of NAUTICAL miles because they had their flight planning in MPH because the aircraft POH listed speeds in MPH. Ugg. That meant their long-cross-country flight didn’t get far enough. So, watch for that.

But in this case, let’s look at a different scenario.

Here is the flight.

When we first look at this, it looks like it just might happen to meet the requirements. Surely it is long enough for total distance, and the first leg of the flight from KMKG to KILN shows as 250 nautical miles.

But, as a DPE, I have to dig in to make sure in a case like this. The FAR says it must be at least 250 NM, and I know that ForeFlight (the app from which this screen shot is from) rounds up to the higher number when it is greater than the .5 from the lower number, so, a distance of 249.6 in this case would round up to 250 NM.

This is what it looked like in the flight plan log.

Time to hold your breath as an applicant if the DPE looks across the table from you and says, “Umm, I need to look closer to see if your long-cross-country flight actually meets the requirements.”

So, let’s look at it in another flight planning software for a second opinion.

Oh crap, that makes it worse.

When I pulled up the same flight in iFlightPlanner, which shows the details to the tenth of a mile, it shows the distance between the two airports as 249.9 NM.

This is less than 250 NM and now is an indication that the cross-country flight flown to meet the requirements for the initical commercial pilot certificate would not have met the regulatory requirements.

Sinking feeling for the DPE who is there to do the checkride, for the CFI who had their student (potentially) fly a flight that won’t actually meet the requirements, and the applicant who is being told they may need to fly a time consuming (and very expensive) flight and that their checkride may not be happening.

Can we save this?

Maybe.

We have one flight planning software that says good to go, one that says no.

What breaks the tie?

Well, we have to go into super details for this one, and find the actual airport reference point that is listed as the latitude/longitude position for the airport.

You can find this in the chart supplement page for each airport.

They look like these:

With these numbers, we can actually put those designated points into a GPS distance calculator. There are lots of these around the internet that you can use, they they take the details down to very minute details.

If we do that with these two particular airport reference points, it looks like the output we see here.

Oh dang..

The tie breaker in numbers.

In this particular instance, we find that the points were 249.63 NM apart when we reference the actual FAA given airport reference points.

It means that the long-cross-country flight in this case, does not actually count.

Barely.

The lesson here, if you are down to the closest of details, use the actual reference points and get into the details to get an answer.

A more important lesson for CFIs and applicants seeking to complete intial commercial pilot certificates?

Don’t cut it this close. Find a point that is clearly MORE than the minimum requirement that is needed so when you get to the checkride your DPE doesn’t have to go through this calculation and potentially tell you that the cross-country flight you completed (for any ratuing or certifciate) doesn’t meet the requirements and you have to fly it over.

Go for more than just the minimum to make sure.