"I Fly IFR"

Different types of flying currency tend to lapse if you do not fly often enough. For flying VFR, it's not so hard to maintain currency or to regain it: you need three takeoffs and landings in the past 90 days -- and that's only to carry passengers; for practical purposes, that means you can always get current on your own (if you haven't flown in a while, it may be a good idea to take a CFI along, though). There are additional requirements for flying at night, but these can be accomplished on your own as well.

On the other hand, for flying IFR, it's a bit different. In the past six months, you must have had, under actual or simulated conditions, six instrument approaches, a hold, and you must have intercepted/tracked navigational courses. If you let the six month currency lapse, you cannot file IFR, and you have six additional months to fulfill the requirements in VFR conditions - with a safety pilot on board. Easy enough thus far, with the caveat that you not only have very specific tasks to accomplish, but you cannot really accomplish them on your own, since you will most probably need a safety pilot: even when flying IFR, conditions at your destination airport have to be such that your approach is conducted under actual conditions. That rarely happens, so most IFR proficiency is accomplished in visual conditions while wearing a view-limiting device (also known as "under the hood") -- with either a pilot buddy (free!) or an instructor (paid).

Looking back at my logbook, I did three approaches, a hold, and I flew IFR cross country last September. Before that, I did six approaches, a hold, and some course tracking in June, 2006. What does that mean? Well, I was definitely out of currency for filing IFR -- but not only that! My additional six month grace period for accomplishing the requirements under VFR conditions was almost over. And, as nicely outlined by the FAA in 14 CFR 61.57(d), if you let this additional grace period lapse, you're up for an "instrument proficiency check", which is almost like an instrument checkride all over again. Yikes!

What to do? Take Milen along as a safety pilot, and get instrument current! We did that a couple of weekends ago in the Arrow. It actually went quite well -- better than I expected, probably because I did quite a bit of instrument practice in Microsoft Flight Simulator X (the game actually works quite well for practicing IFR procedures -- if you do everything exactly right, set the realism settings to most realistic, and get used to a bit of extra sensitivity on the yoke). We started off with an ILS 16R to Paine, followed by a VOR 16R, followed by a hold at the Paine VOR (which included tracking directly to the VOR). The Seattle Center controllers were not very busy, so we got vectors for a practice LOC 34 to Arlington, and then we did the ILS 16R approach to Paine again three times. After 1.6 hours of hood time, I'm instrument current. Note, though: current does not necessarily mean proficient. These are just the minimums so that I do not have to go through an instrument checkride in June!