Flight Deck Management

Three separate duties, and they're worth knowing as written:

• 91.107(a)(1) — no pilot may take off unless the PIC ensures that each person on board is briefed on how to fasten and unfasten that person's safety belt and, if installed, shoulder harness
• 91.107(a)(2) — no pilot may cause to be moved on the surface, take off, or land unless the PIC ensures each person has been notified to fasten belt and harness
• 91.107(a)(3) — each person must occupy an approved seat or berth with belt and, if installed, shoulder harness properly secured during movement on the surface, takeoff, and landing

Note (a)(2) bites before the airplane rolls, not at the runway.

CA.II.B.S2 requires you to conduct a briefing that identifies the pilot-in-command and covers:

• safety belts
• shoulder harnesses
• doors
• passenger conduct
• sterile aircraft
• propeller blade avoidance
• emergency procedures

Identifying the PIC is the item applicants skip — and it's the one that matters most commercially, because a paying passenger who owns the airplane or hired you may assume the authority runs the other way.

Because the person who is paying may also be the person most invested in going. Saying out loud at the start that you are pilot in command, that you'll make the go/no-go and diversion calls, and that you'll explain them afterward converts a potential mid-flight negotiation into a settled expectation. It also sets up the sterile-cockpit request so that asking for quiet on final isn't read as rudeness.

No non-essential conversation or activity during critical phases — taxi, takeoff, approach, landing, and any abnormal situation. AC 120-71 is the ACS reference for II.B; the PHAK is blunter about the taxi case specifically: remain heads-up with eyes outside, devote your entire attention to surface navigation, and complete all checklists while the aircraft is stopped — "there is no place for non-essential chatter or other activities" (PHAK ch. 14). Brief it before engine start so the rule exists before you need it.

Make it physical and absolute rather than advisory: nobody approaches or leaves the airplane except by the route you point out, nobody walks forward of the wing, and nobody moves until you say so. The AFH's own warning is that "the propeller is nearly invisible," and serious injuries and fatalities have occurred when people who just started an engine walked or reached into the propeller arc to remove chocks or reach the cabin — chocks are approached only from the rear of the propeller, never from the front or the side, with the throttle at idle (AFH ch. 2).

For part 91 VFR there is no rule mandating current paper charts, but you must become familiar with all available information concerning the flight, and stale data undermines that claim directly (91.103). IFR/RNAV operations are where currency becomes a hard gate. The commercial habit: verify the database cycle before taxi as a checklist item, know which of your sources is authoritative when two disagree, and treat an expired cycle as a maintenance squawk, not a footnote. The PHAK folds database currency, automation status, and emergency backup systems into "the Plane" of the 5 Ps (PHAK ch. 2).

You inspect it yourself. Anything unsecured is a projectile in turbulence and a control-jam risk on the floor, and unlogged mass invalidates the weight and balance you computed.

Practically:

• know the weight and location of every item
• verify it's within the baggage compartment placard and the loading envelope
• confirm restraint straps and the baggage door latch as part of your flow
• refuse anything you can't identify

Cargo you didn't load is also a security item (Task II.A).

• Program before you move. Not while taxiing — checklists and programming happen stopped (PHAK ch. 14).
• Always know the current mode, and verify it did what you asked rather than assuming.
• Disconnect first, troubleshoot second if the airplane does something unexpected.
• Treat the tablet or phone as equipment, not furniture. CA.II.B.R1 names portable electronic devices explicitly. Mount it where it can't foul the controls or block the panel, charge it, brief its failure (a paper or panel backup for the diagram and approach you actually need), and put the phone on do-not-disturb before engine start — an incoming call during a taxi clearance is the distraction the rule is aimed at.
• Never let a PED become the sole source of required data. It is not certified installed equipment, so verify anything load-bearing against an installed or published source.

The underlying risk the FAA names is complacency: automation intended to reduce workload "essentially removes the pilot from the process of managing the aircraft, thereby reducing situational awareness and leading to complacency," so its output has to be continually monitored (AFH ch. 2).

Appendix 2 is explicit: in a single-pilot airplane you should demonstrate CRM principles as SRM, and if reading the checklist while accomplishing an element would be unsafe or impractical, you should perform the published or recommended immediate-action memory items and then review the checklist once conditions permit. What's assessed is whether you demonstrate CRM, appropriately divide attention, and use proper visual scanning — not whether the card was in your hand at every instant.

Run 91.213 the same way you would alone, then say it out loud. Is the item required by the type design or equipment list, by 91.205 for this operation, or by an AD? If not required, it must be removed (control placarded, maintenance recorded per 43.9) or deactivated and placarded "Inoperative" — and, the step most often skipped, 91.213(d)(4) requires a determination by an appropriately rated pilot or mechanic that the inoperative item does not constitute a hazard to the aircraft. Only then may you go. If required, the flight doesn't move until it's repaired or properly deferred. The commercial delta is the second question and the announcement: legal to go is not the same as smart for this mission, and passengers who hear the reasoning before the delay accept it far better than passengers who hear it after.

Assign a task with a defined scope — traffic callouts, holding the checklist, reading a frequency. Human resource management is the effective use of all available resources, human, equipment, and information (AFH ch. 2), and a briefed passenger scanning for traffic is a resource. The boundary is set in the briefing: during sterile phases they speak up immediately for traffic, smoke, or fire, and hold everything else until cruise.

Fly the airplane first — the cabin cannot be allowed to pull you out of the loop. Then apply the fix you already briefed: air vent open, sick bag located, eyes on the horizon, and a descent or a course change to smoother air if it's available. Tell them what you're doing; uncertainty is most of what makes passengers anxious. If the situation degrades to a genuine medical problem, it becomes a diversion decision, and the earlier you make it the more options you have — the FAA's point about diverting from cruise rather than the final approach fix applies (PHAK ch. 2).

Who is PIC, and how controls are exchanged. The ACS recommends a positive three-step process: the first pilot says "You have the flight controls," the second acknowledges immediately with "I have the flight controls," the first repeats "You have the flight controls" and visually confirms the exchange (ACS Appendix 2). Both pilots use a visual check. Doubt about who is flying the aircraft should not occur — and the briefing that prevents it happens prior to flight.

Yes. Appendix 2 states that numerous studies indicate many accidents have occurred when the pilot was distracted during critical phases of flight, and directs the evaluator to incorporate realistic distractions during the flight portion to evaluate situational awareness and the ability to maintain proper control technique while dividing attention inside and outside the flight deck. Treat every dropped pencil, sudden question, and unrelated request as a graded item: acknowledge it, fly the airplane, and return to the checklist by backing up several steps rather than guessing where you were.