FAA in G-Reg abroad. Worrying development.
So here's the situation.
I have an FAA PPL and am trying to join a syndicate in the UK. My understanding (and that of a lot of others here and on Flyer) is that I am automatically validated by the ANO to fly a G-Reg and should then be able to fly day VFR in any other ICAO country.
Two members of the syndicate, a CFI and a CAA examiner, were absolutely adamant that this wasn't the case. Myself and the syndicate secretary independently phoned the CAA and both spoke to a Denisha Pelia to seek confirmation. She conferred with a senior policy bod called Joan Gardner and called me to confirm this. I asked for an email confirmation and was assured I would get one.
Despite this the CAA examiner (and the CFI) weren't convinced. The examiner was so unhappy about being wrong that he said he was going to take it up with the CAA himself (worrying considering he works there).
Fast-forward 2 1/2 weeks and having got no email I got worried and phoned up to chase. I then got sent an email saying I would need the permission of each country I wanted to fly in. After being given the run around for a couple of days I finally, by making a serious nuisance of myself, spoke to Joan Gardner directly. She now stated that this was indeed the case.
I argued back and forth for 45 mins about whether the position was that under ICAO if I was validated in a G-Reg by the ANO then I was allowed by default and an explicit difference would have to be filed to forbid me and she absolutely refused to give me a straight answer. All she would do is keep repeating that either way the only way to find out would be to contact each country individually and therefore what difference would it make?
As far as I'm concerned it's a massive difference between the default position being I'm not allowed unless some sort of agreement is in place and being allowed unless a difference is in place.
I raised my concerns that this all seemed a bit of a change following a CAA examiner promising to get involved and she was pretty non-committal.
Does anyone have any record or names wrt to conversations they've had with the CAA over this? I really need to get some sort of definitive answer and have now spoken to apparently the person whose word goes and still got nowhere.
Everything I've read on here and Flyer led me to believe this issue was fairly cut and dried. Help!
This affects everyone on an ICAO PPL and flying a G-reg so it would be great to get something definitive.
Last edited by ILOC; 2nd Mar 2010 at 15:48.