Information on EASA FCL?

[flybymike]

Here is the latest from IAOPA.

EASA to move against the N-register

EASA has finally shown its hand on the issue of N-registered aircraft based in Europe, and the news is bad. The Agency intends to make it illegal for pilots domiciled in Europe to fly perrmanently in Europe on American licenses, which will come as a hammer blow to holders of the FAA Instrument Rating. An estimated 10,000 European pilots will have to convert to JAA or EASA licenses, by a process and at a cost that has yet to be established. In the case of the Instrument Rating, it is not clear whether any credit at all will be given for having an FAA IR when applying for a European equivalent. It will certainly mean substantial and costly additional training and the sitting of seven examinations. The number of pilots driven out of general aviation, or declining to come in, is likely to be high.
IAOPA is particularly aghast at the sweeping nature of EASA’s intentions because they have nothing to do with safety. Over the decades in which the current system has pertained there have been no safety issues with oversight, with instrument flying, with maintenance or any other factor. General aviation is being sucked into a trade war involving the big beasts at Boeing and Airbus, with protectionist tactics grinding up our own GA industry in pursuit of political point-scoring.
A European pilot who obtains a licence or rating in the United States will be required to undergo as-yet unspecified validation and checking on his return, and within two years will have to have converted the FAA document to the EASA equivalent, a process which will not be straightforward or inexpensive. In the case of the Instrument Rating, EASA plans to require the applicant to study for and pass all seven written exams and undergo flight training which will probably cost tens of thousands of euros even for pilots who've been flying safely for decades on FAA IRs. While it will still be legal to own an N-registered aircraft, the market in such aircraft will shrink, with some that have been modified to FAA STCs being rendered unsaleable in Europe. Those pilots who have American PPLs but cannot attain JAR Class II medical standards will also be adversely affected.
The plans, set out by EASA’s Deputy Head of Rulemaking Eric Sivel in a note to AOPA UK, confirm IAOPA’s fears that political chauvinism is taking precedence over safety and good sense. M Sivel says the proposals are stipulated in the Basic Regulation which covers everything EASA does. However, in talks with EC Transport Commissioner Daniel Calleja and others over the past five years IAOPA has been given to understand they could be flexed at the Implementing Rule stage. In its response to EASA’s consultation on the implementation of its Flight Crew Licensing proposals IAOPA pointed out that if a state has issued a licence and a medical in accordance with ICAO standards, other states should accept it without adding onerous requirements. Now, however, we are being told it is set in stone.
The end result will be that if EASA gets its way, going to America for a PPL will be pointless; but how many of those who were contemplating it will now get EASA licenses instead? Of the FAA licence and IR holders now in Europe, how many will pay the money and take the time to covert, and how many will simply walk away? And at the end of it all, what will have been gained?
IAOPA Senior Vice President Martin Robinson is meeting IAOPA’s lawyers in Brussels next week to discuss options.

[peter272]

So within weeks of Eric Sivel speaking at the AOPA Duxford meeting, all that good work is undone

EASA are either being deliberately slimy or are useless at communicating. Probably both

[IO540]

Both, definitely.

[172driver]

The end result will be that if EASA gets its way, going to America for a PPL will be pointless

Actually, no. Just don't come back to this benighted continent.

[hum]

To be sure to be sure

Our licences are totally illegal used on this aircraft and have no bearing to that aircraft but we expect him to have them anyway although they dont mean a thing on N reg and might as well be Marine boat handling licences for what they are worth!

I think I'll get one of these before the rush... (to go along with National, JAA, FAA licences...) anyone know how many exams you have to pass to get a boat licence?

[Fuji Abound]

anyone know how many exams you have to pass to get a boat licence?

Just one - practical and theory are combined.

Of course you dont need a license in the UK, but you do in much of the rest of Europe - but just wait until they decide to unify the laws on that!

[BEagle]

Being Pythonesque, all EASA was supposed to be was 'JAA crossed out and EASA written in crayon....' qv YouTube - Monty Python - Fish License

Evidence must now be gathering at the complete farce for which these bungling €urocrats are entirely to blame.

[Pace]

However, there is zero doubt that the trustee is the legal owner, and piercing a trust arrangement is very difficult. Trusts have been established for centuries and are accepted widely.

10540

The trust which is Non European is the legal owner so no problem there we then come to the operator?

The PPL flying a Cirrus would be classified as the operator unless He/she secures a third party operator?

It all comes down to the definition of operator which may not be as clear on a one man band show as in a larger aircraft where it is common practice to use an outside operator while having the crew seperate.

Whether using a facility in the IOM on the IOM reg classified as an "operator" but in reality a routing system would suffice who knows.
Regardless I could see many court cases.

We should do what the french have always done. 10000 N reg pilots all ignoring the law and refusing to accept or acknowledge that law would cause pandemonium and a relook at the whole thing but we are not the french.

As one poster put it we shouldl just lie down and be raped with a smile on our faces in gratitude to the rapist

Face it my proposal of a mass petition generated through the huge focus of PPRUNE and its thousands of aviation enthusiasts hardly generated any interest?

Pace

[Fuji Abound]

Pace

Face it my proposal of a mass petition generated through the huge focus of PPRuNe and its thousands of aviation enthusiasts hardly generated any interest?

Dont take this the wrong way please but I am surprised you reached that conclusion giving up so easily. What did you expect? A string of posters telling you what a good idea it was?

It doesnt take too much effort through these forum to get pilot's to support initiatives of this sort - but it does take some effort.

If you started a petition and made yourself busy promoting the petition you would be amased how much support it would receive. None of us (almost without exception) support this nonesense.

However the trouble is we are happy to bitch about it, but few are prepared to put in any effort.

All credit to you for suggesting the petition, and no shame if you cant be bothered to take it any further, but dont expect people to fall over themselves supporting your efforts before you have even set the first hurdle, never mind crossed it. When it comes to lobbying, life just does not work that way.

[IO540]

I think more than one factor has been at work on this EASA stuff.

Firstly only the saddest anoraks read the EASA docs. Personally I lose interest after the first page and then I just speed-read, which I think most normal people do and is exactly what EASA hopes for. If I was running EASA that is what I would be doing: writing thousands of pages of bull***t. I am getting paid for it by the EU, after all. Wonderful stuff, which won't be repeated in my lifetime. So a lot of people have been ignoring this whole thing because they cannot get their head around what it means, or what it might mean.

Secondly there is a lot of apathy among pilots, especially UK ones.

This FCL stuff is not a done deal yet and won't be for quite a while. It needs wide publicity, especially at the top political level and especially abroad, especially in the USA where the Airbus tanker contract stuff is hitting the fan as I speak. A single tanker is worth 1000x more than the entire FCL proposal, and don't forget that Airbus = France = EASA = EU (de facto). 1 phone call is all it takes to squash this whole thing. It's called political reality.

Any publicity is worth doing.

[172driver]

It needs wide publicity, especially at the top political level and especially abroad, especially in the USA where the Airbus tanker contract stuff is hitting the fan as I speak

Quite. I'm sure a well-crafted letter by IAOPA to the relevant people in the US government / congress / senate along the lines of 'American pilots are being discriminated against in Europe' might well work wonders....

[S-Works]

Quite. I'm sure a well-crafted letter by IAOPA to the relevant people in the US government / congress / senate along the lines of 'American pilots are being discriminated against in Europe' might well work wonders....

American pilots are not being discriminated against in anyway. Just Europeans that happened to have chosen the USA as a flag of convenience are being brought into line with the those operating under the normal regulations.

[janbrill]

American pilots are not being discriminated against in anyway. Just Europeans that happened to have chosen the USA as a flag of convenience are being brought into line with the those operating under the normal regulations.

Yikes! Didn't know Mr. Sivel was taking part in the discussion. I would be very, very careful in defining the motives of owners and pilots choosing the FAA-system for their operations.

It might very well be, they choose the n-register as a flag of:

• Sanity, to register their brandnew or old aircraft for which the EASA doesn't provide any means of registration (due to chauvinistisc protectionism, bureaucratic inaction, incompetence or all of the above).
  
  
• Security, because they operate in areas of the world where the organisation-based maintenance-approach of the EASA simply doesn't fly.
  
  
• Safety, because they want a reasonable way to fly IFR and prefer to operate under a set of regulations that has demonstrated for decades an unequaled safety-record - anytime, anyplace.
  
  
• Freedom, because JAR/EASA denies them a medical due to unprooven and scientifically unfounded fears and myths. These pilots certainly won't be "brought into line" as you state. They will be kicked out of line. Period. And while I don't know what your activity in aviation is, I doubt fewer pilots, fewer aircraft and fewer flights will help your business.

Regards,
Jan Brill
Managing Editor
Pilot und Flugzeug

[Pace]

American pilots are not being discriminated against in anyway. Just Europeans that happened to have chosen the USA as a flag of convenience are being brought into line with the those operating under the normal regulations.

European pilots who legitimately hold FAA licences are being discriminated against big time.

Bose lets talk the truth.

This will cost many FAA licence holders a fortune. There are 10000 FAA licence holders in Europe who have been forced to take that route as the European regulations are so unfriendly towards GA.

EASA could quite happily have put a European PPL IR into place based on the FAA system and the problem would have vapourised.

FAA has been in Europe for decades, pilots have and do run careers under FAA and one legal friend even thinks there is a possibility of suing EASA for those costs. The practice has been inground in our history through time and these pilots will be financially damaged through no fault of their own. The damage is purely through the bully boy tactics of EASA.

EASA wanted a way to get rid of N reg based in Europe.

Their best call was to find evidence that EASA licences were safer and as such they could claim that EASA licences were required on a safety basis.

Quangos, research groups infact could not find that evidence.

Surprisingly Part 135 ops are safer than the equivalent AOC ops although less regulated. regarding jets! private jet ops have also come out to be safer than the strictly controlled and expensive to run AOC OPS.

EASA has chosen to work against aviation with their burocratic nonsense and are damaging a lot of people as well as European aviation in the process for no sensible reason and piling huge costs onto our industry through their actions.

I do hope that AOPA find lots of legal faults in what they are attempting to do as absolutely nothing positive has come from EASA. They should have been disbanded last time.

ALL REGULATIONS should be based on one thing only and thats safety sadly they are NOT and that is where EASA is wrong.

Pace

[SunnyDayInWiltshire]

Pushback against excessive Health and Safety regulations

BBC reports that the UK government may act to reduce what it sees as excessive Health and Safety regulations - seen by some as an overbearing nanny state - which is claimed to have caused high levels of litigation and a so-called compensation culture.

BBC News - Reduce health and safety burden, Cameron adviser urges

I wondered if the groundswell of support for removing some of the more bizarre aspects of regulations might be used to pushback on these FCL proposals too. (I'm not suggesting where safety would be compromised of course.)

[peter272]

Yeh, right.........

[englishal]

Most of us pilots who never had the burning ambition to operate the gear and flaps on a Boeing (or earn more money doing something else) use the FAA system to modularly build up our qualifications and experiences as a hobby if you like while flying as Private Pilots.

One day maybe we'll get paid to fly, maybe not, or maybe occasionally, but at least I haven't run up £60k debt on the "off chance" that someone might pay me £20,000 pa to dodge thunderstorms in a King Air (though I have been offered the chance to co-pilot a CJ3 using my FAA quals). Under JAR there is no facility to do this, you either commit to it 100% or don't. This in itself is detrimental to flight safety as the FAA found out years ago.

I can also fit valuable safety equipment to our N reg plane - engine monitors which would cost an arm and a leg in fees to fit under EASA, and frankly I wouldn't have them, as an example.

We actually have our plane maintained by a JAR 145 CAA approved company, who work closely with an FAA IA who signs off their work, so by being on the N reg we still maintain our aeroplane to the same standards as G reg aeroplanes....The difference is the reduction in some fees and charges, and after hearing horror stories this week of ARC renewal fees at some places running up to £1300 (where the CAA only take £75) there is a definite tendency for aviators to be ripped off in the UK. Which is why I am glad to be out of the system.

If I was forced to go back to the G reg, I think I'd fly our plane to the USA and sell it, then only fly a permit aeroplane in the UK, and go and spend all my money on several flying holidays in the USA each year....and maybe fly something more exciting.

Note: Even some of the well voiced "experts" on here, while they like to give the appearance they are some sort of CAA apointed SkyGod, only hold JAA PPL's but use these "flags of convenience" and various EU loopholes to work their way into a paid flying job in Europe - perfectly legally I assume.

[IO540]

Just come out of AOPA...

EASA's eleventh-hour attempt to bounce the industry into accepting
disastrous regulations aimed at killing off the N-register in Europe have
shocked the aviation world and led to frantic last-minute moves to stop the
Agency bulldozing new rules through the European Commission.
When the Agency finally showed its hand on the N-register it was through
proposals on Flight Crew Licensing which will make it impossible for
European citizens to fly in Europe on American licences, render worthless
the FAA Instrument Rating and blow the bottom out of the market in
N-registered aircraft. If they are adopted, the plans will force thousands
of pilots to undertake new training courses costing millions of euros and
slide the already-depressed used aircraft market into the mire. The safety
benefit will be zero.
After years of discussion, the details became clear just two weeks before
the EC was due to make a final decision on EASA's proposals. IAOPA is asking
the Commission to set the issue aside to allow time for its impact to be
properly assessed.
The plans fly in the face of every assurance given by EASA's principals that
while they wanted European pilots to fly on European registers, they would
properly address the reasons why they did not. EASA's Executive Director
Patrick Goudou promised in 2005: "We will ensure there are no special
advantages to being on the N-register." He has not kept his side of the
bargain. Few of the compelling reasons why European pilots are driven into
the arms of the FAA have been addressed, and those that have been looked at
have been skimmed over in a desultory and unsatisfactory way.
EASA's claimed motivation for attacking the N-register is safety, but that
is a smoke-screen for political chauvinism. Aviation is a trade battleground
between Europe and America, and pilots and owners are caught between the
trenches. There has never been any evidence, or even any credible claim,
that the N-register is unsafe. With this move, EASA has gone far beyond its
safety remit and stepped completely into the realms of political
protectionism.
IAOPA-Europe met in Amsterdam at the weekend to plan a response. Delegates
from 17 European countries debated emergency tactics, and Craig Spence, Vice
President of Regulatory Affairs for AOPA US, flew in from Washington. He
left with a full understanding of the gravity and urgency of the matter.
AOPA UK's Pam Campbell outlined the issue which, she said, had come as
"something of a bombshell". To fly an aircraft in Europe, no matter what the
country of register, would require an EASA licence and if applicable an EASA
Instrument Rating, if you were domiciled in Europe. A stop-gap validation on
a non-European licence would be available from national aviation
authorities, valid for one year. The pilot would have to apply to the
authority of the nation in which he or she resided. There would be a test
for the validation, and no repeat validation would be possible, although an
extension would be granted for a maximum of one year if the pilot could
prove that training to convert the licence or rating has been commenced.
The minimum requirements to convert a third country PPL would be to pass an
examination in Air Law and Human Performance, a PPL Skills Test and a Class
2 medical. It would also be necessary to demonstrate English language
proficiency, and to have a minimum of 100 hours. That would convert the
licence to a PPL with an SEP rating. Higher qualifications would be granted
subject to additional training at the discretion of the service provider.
The holder of an FAA Instrument Rating would have to study for and sit seven
theoretical knowledge exams, which are currently the greatest barrier to the
IR for private pilots. EASA is tinkering with theoretical knowledge
requirements but there will be few game-changing amendments. It is unclear
whether there would be any credit for American training or hours flown.
Emmanuel Davidson of AOPA France said there were more than 10,000 European
pilots holding FAA licences flying in Europe. "We have to bear in mind that
if your American licence is made illegal and you have an N-registered plane,
when you fly it on a European licence you will have to apply both European
and FAA regulations, which would mean you can only fly in the country that
has issued your licence. It will be illegal to fly, say, from France to
Germany or England to Belgium. Those aircraft which have been modified to
FAA STCs may not be able to go on the European register and will have to be
sold, but to whom? A glut of aircraft will come onto the market, and the
only place you'd be able to sell them would be America. There will be
massive compensation claims against EASA and the EC."
IAOPA Senior Vice President Martin Robinson said this had been sprung on the
industry at the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour, and that all
assurances given by EASA and EC figures that the situation was not as dire
as it seemed had proved valueless. "We are facing a firing squad which has
its rifles cocked," he said. "EASA has consulted on Part FCL, and in
response to IAOPA's specific comments on third country licences it responded
with one word - 'Noted.' That is all. EASA sends its work as an opinion to
the European Commission, which has a time frame in which to accept or
reject, and the hearing for that is on the 13th and 14th October."
IAOPA has already met with MEPs and European Commission figures and more
meetings are scheduled with the aim of getting the Commission to allow more
time to discuss the issue. "Our first objective is to get the EC wound up to
'park' the issue so the ramifications can be looked at," Robinson said. "In
the short time we have available, there is no other option. Then we have to
work on how we modify the text to get a proper resolution.
"There is no guarantee that the EC will listen. They could say we've had our
chance, but we can demonstrate that our comments simply haven't been
listened to. The regulatory impact of this will be enormous, and I believe
they are poorly understood, even at EASA. I cannot believe they have done a
proper Regulatory Impact Assessment on FCL. If they even begin to work out
how many people would be driven out of aviation by this, EASA and the EC
would recoil from it."
There is little individual AOPA members can do at this late stage to
influence events. Martin Robinson said: "If you feel strongly about this you
can write to Mike Smethers, Chairman of the EASA Board of Management, at the
CAA in Kingsway, with a copy to your local MEP. But time is so short that we
can only take emergency measures at this stage."
IAOPA will keep members informed of progress as it happens.

[Fuji Abound]

IO540 - I think this is a very well written article, sums up the frustration so many of us feel, as well as outlining the enormous impact this will have on GA in Europe.

I am more convinced that ever that EASA are not fit for purpose, and are proving themselves to be one of the worst examples of Europe not serving its people.

It is such a shame that a genuine opportunity has been missed.

[IO540]

Somebody ought to circulate this to the Marketing head of Cessna, Piper, and the various light jet manufacturers.

I had already done so a year or so ago, but they may think it has gone away.