Welcome Guest. Sign in or Signup

2 Answers

operating experience

Asked by: 1764 views ,
FAA Regulations, Helicopter

what is the required for a Pilots acquire operating experience and operating cycles as helicopter pilot-operated under part 121 

Ace Any FAA Written Test!
Actual FAA Questions / Free Lifetime Updates
The best explanations in the business
Fast, efficient study.
Pass Your Checkride With Confidence!
FAA Practical Test prep that reflects actual checkrides.
Any checkride: Airplane, Helicopter, Glider, etc.
Written and maintained by actual pilot examiners and master CFIs.
The World's Most Trusted eLogbook
Be Organized, Current, Professional, and Safe.
Highly customizable - for student pilots through pros.
Free Transition Service for users of other eLogs.
Our sincere thanks to pilots such as yourself who support AskACFI while helping themselves by using the awesome PC, Mac, iPhone/iPad, and Android aviation apps of our sponsors.

2 Answers



  1. Jeff Baum on Feb 05, 2022

    You’ll be dealing with three different regulations.

    1) FAR 61 subpart G, specifically 61.161 regarding ATP Rotorcraft/Helicopter will show you the aeronautical experience required for an ATP Certificate in that category and class.

    2) FAR 121.436 which covers Pilot Qualifications while operating under part 121.

    3) FAR 121.439 which covers part 121 recently experience.

    There are a few more regulations which would come into play, but these are the main regs.

    “Cycles” is not referenced in the FARs, only “Flight Time”.

    +1 Votes Thumb up 1 Votes Thumb down 0 Votes



  2. Kris Kortokrax on Feb 06, 2022

    You’ll also be dealing with reality. To my knowledge, there are no helicopter operations being conducted under Part 121.

    I suspect that you either are an aspiring helicopter pilot or a pilot with a helicopter rating wanting to build time to acquire a job flying helicopters.

    Operators don’t look only for total time. Most will set some threshold for turbine time, as most helicopter Part 135 operators use turbine helicopters.

    The minimum pilot requirements for Part 135 are contained in 135.243.

    0 Votes Thumb up 0 Votes Thumb down 0 Votes


The following terms have been auto-detected the question above and any answers or discussion provided. Click on a term to see its definition from the Dauntless Aviation JargonBuster Glossary.

Answer Question

Our sincere thanks to all who contribute constructively to this forum in answering flight training questions. If you are a flight instructor or represent a flight school / FBO offering flight instruction, you are welcome to include links to your site and related contact information as it pertains to offering local flight instruction in a specific geographic area. Additionally, direct links to FAA and related official government sources of information are welcome. However we thank you for your understanding that links to other sites or text that may be construed as explicit or implicit advertising of other business, sites, or goods/services are not permitted even if such links nominally are relevant to the question asked.