logbook re-creation help
 

Complicated/frustrating situation that I am finding myself in and hoping some folks can help me out. I went to a 141 school and did my private to CFI. A week before graduation my flight bag was stolen from my car parked by the school of aeronautics (jerk). Inside was my log book. Luckily on my last 8710 I put all my cumulative flight times down. Since college, I've been flying in the military. When I got hired my squadron members told me that I didn't need to keep a logbook because the Air Force would do that for me. So I didn't (bad move on my part). Now that I realized that this was bad gouge, I am trying to recreate my logbook for future airline jobs. I have a copy of my 8710, a copy of the police report, copies of all the flights I did in college to substantiate my 8710 and a copy of my flight history report from the air force. When applying to regionals, do I need to have a flight by flight logbook or can I just put block time in for warrior, arrow, seminole, T-6, T-44 and C-130? Any experiences, input, advice is greatly appreciated. I've heard they really want to see line by line logbooks but since I have all legitimate and official documents I hope they will understand. Thanks!

Sorry to hear about it getting stolen, there are some very nasty people in this world.

I've heard of people applying to regionals and getting hired just by bringing in a printout of an electronic logbook. I'd say if you had a nice, easy to read format of your flights (line by line) electronically and printed that out you should be okay. You can also explain the situation and show them the documentation you have. They can't really ask anything more of you. It's going to be a pain to go line by line and try to recreate everything, but better to do it now than later on when you have even more hours.

Hope this helps!

I would just make an electronic (or a new paper but I highly recommend digital) logbook, put in single line entries for all the times you know (basically carrying forward from another logbook), annotate the logbook loss in there, and start fresh line by line. All my mil pilot training times were entered in a single line entry by aircraft type, because I was told the mil would keep track of my times. At the end of my first close out (end of pilot training), I wasn't satisfied with the tracking of flight time, so I started logging line by line. Also, my branch of service lost a lot of my flight time so I had to prove I flew it each close out. At the time of my logbook scrub in ground school, I showed my paper logbook with my civilian stuff, the single entries for my mil stuff, and my printout of flight times from the mil. That satisfied their needs. I have since created and used an excel sheet that has everything line by line civ and mil combined. Only my mil pilot training entries are blocks of times now, everything else is line by line.

Your situation probably won't matter for the regionals. May for the majors, but I know Atlas doesn't even look at logbooks anymore. Just start now, with all previously stated documentation, and you should be fine.

What he said.

Good news is that with the mil experience, the prior civilian training time should not be a deal breaker or maker either way. So nobody should have the need to delve into the details of the 141 time.

A friend of mine interviewed at a regional with me, and he was prior military and didn't have a logbook. Just showed up with the hours print out from the Air Force and his previous regional and got hired. So it probably won't be a deal breaker for the regionals right now.

I would second the recommendation to go with a digital logbook. Just put one line entry for each aircraft and put the totals to the best of your knowlege there. There is no right or wrong way to log your flight times, you can write it on a napkin and show up to the interview if you want. At this point in the game, I doubt it would make much of a difference at a regional.

My first two logbooks with about 830 documented hours, disappeared during my move from PBI to ATL. Recreating my time took many, many hours. I was recently asked about the missing entries during a regional interview. Fortunately, I came prepared with documentation of how I recreated my logbook.

I ordered a copy of every one of my airman, medical and Part 135 authorization forms so I could approximate my hours at the time each one was filed. The problem is that like so many pilots, I sometimes entered only the basic flight requirements for the rating or certificate I was applying for.

All of my training after PVT-SEL was received at 141 schools, so there were records available. Some of the instructors had file copies of my endorsements. I was able to obtain aircraft dispatch records from three of six schools where I either trained or instructed.

In the end, I probably shorted myself about 30 hours of ME and 200 hours of various other flight time in my recreated logbook. I suppose it's better to err on the conservative side.

I now photocopy every logbook endorsement. All other my logbook entries are kept in LogTen Pro with multiple backups. LogTen Pro for iOS devices allows your CFI or check airman to sign your electronic logbook.

To echo the other folks on here. I didn't keep a line by line log of my military time (15.5 years). When I started prepping last fall for my transition, I took my Flying History report and made a single line entry in logbook pro for each aircraft I flew in the military. (I made two entries for my C-17 time, one for prior to AC school and one for all time after AC School) All flying I've done since then, I've kept a line by line entry in my electronic logbook. So now, when I use logbook pro to print out totals, etc. It has all my military time included with my line by line entries. For things such as PIC, cross-country, etc. that the military doesn't keep track of, I used my own calculations and estimations and include a page explaining what I did to come up with those totals.

I bought a leather binder and keep up too date printouts of everything and include my explanation sheet and flying history report in there as well and that's what I brought to my regional interviews (PSA & SkyWest). Neither airline had any questions regarding my flight time.