I believe you can renew your class 1 up to 45days preceding the expiry date and still keep the same date. I havent had time to look it up in writing so I stand to be corrected on this!
The European Space Agency are recruiting astronauts for missions in future years for anybody interested in this area! A JAA Class 2 medical is a pre-requisite (Which im sure many forumites have already). Also they deem people with flying experience favourably and also a Degree in a technical subject...
The allowable dioptres for short sight is -6.00 and max difference between each eye of 2 dioptres. The CAA have a good summary of JAA Class 1 eye sight requirements here : http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/49/SRG_MED-JA ... ialVisStds[2189].pdf
I had a look through the JAR-FCL 3 and couldnt see any mention of a class 1 reverting back down to class 2 status, but thats not to say it isnt in there because only looked for about 10minutes! It would make sense if it did revert back down to class 2 status because if you can pass a class 1 on a pa...
I have had my bog standard Sennheiser HME 100 and have been more than happy with its service to me for the past 2/3 years. Good value for money also...
The same 28day currency rule applies at NFC also and my understanding is that it is an insurance requirement as flyer said. I dont find it that big a deal and if your out of your 28days usually a quick hop (Usually a half hour,few circuits with a glide approach) with an instructor will sort you out....
On the topic of NFC fleet renewal I see that on the website ( http://www.nfc.ie/joomla/index.php?opti ... &Itemid=25 ) a number of the 150's and 172's are up for sale as is the Citation for a nice ?800,000 if you've some pocket money to spare
After reading the CAA document I am led to believe that they will allow Flight Examiners who have themselves been assessed to level 6 proficiency to carry out "informal language proficiency assessments for existing licence holders" and "the assessments that they carry out can only be ...