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Old 20th Mar 2019, 12:50
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Mike Flynn
 
Join Date: Feb 2016
Location: S.E.Asia
Posts: 1,953
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N Reg; A Flag of Convenience?

I have started this new thread to pick up where the recent Alderney accident left off.

In my opinion there are many ‘grey charter’ and other ad hoc operators who must be looking at their methods of operations following the Sala accident.

It was unusual to see a UK owner flying a US registered aircraft when I started flying in 1981.

Over the intervening years N reg aircraft have popped up everywhere in Europe and it now appears to be a semi global flag of convenience. This is a term from shipping companies who chose nations such as Liberia and Monrovia to register their fleet to avoid regulators.

The owners of these aircraft are hidden behind trusts such as Southern Air Consultancy at Bungay in East Anglia which is little more than a brass plate office. By chance they operated out of a house just a few miles from my UK home until a couple of years ago. It now appears they have many N aircraft registered in the UK to this small Suffolk office.

Here in Asia it is forbidden to base a non local registered aircraft in the various countries for longer than a few months.

Recent events have focused on this use of N reg in Europe.

The argument is that the US register is much easier to operate an aircraft than the more stringent European equivalent.

Clearly the news in recent days suggests that maybe the operators of US registered aircraft need to address how they comply with the FAA regulations.

Will we start to see the CAA prosecutors addressing this grey area that undermines genuine AOC operators?




Last edited by Mike Flynn; 20th Mar 2019 at 22:50.
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