EASA OPS Part-NCO Opinion published
 

EASA OPS Part-NCO has now been published as Opinion 01/2012. The draft Implementing Rules are in this document.

These rules will apply to non-commercial operations of other-than-complex motor-powered aircraft that fall within EASA's remit (i.e. not Annex II aircraft). Note that almost all light aircraft are "other-than-complex" in EASA speak - it excludes jets and multi-engine turboprops. Timescales are currently unclear: they were intended to apply from April 2012, but it's likely to take a year for them to get through comitology and EU parliament.

I'm more intrigued by the noise abatement procedures which apply to balloons. :ugh:

Here in Germany where powered aircraft are not allowed to descend below 500ft (apart from take-off and landing of course) balloons are really the noisiest things in the sky most people will encounter. I live in an area that seems to be very popular with hot air balloons on sightseeing trips and I can confirm, that a balloonist opening his burner 100ft above one's head (they always do, because there's a hill behind the place where we live) makes a lot more noise than a Cessna 172 passing at 500ft! Not that it it matters to me, but I can understand the rulemakers concern.

Until they were put straight, they wanted to make it a legal requirement for all aircraft to land into wind; including balloons. There would have been a lot of holding in nil wind conditions!

...and also would have required them to carry serviceable airspeed indicators.

Wasn't there something about single engined a/c having to continue climbing after the engine fails?

The other NPA running is for airports; be interesting what that says.

SGC

EASA NCO IMMINENT REGULATIONS
 

According to AOPA a new Regulation regarding NCO operations of complex types and all a/c over 5,700kgs is about to be made law. This seriously affetcs performance and rumour has it that all airfields under 1600mtrs will be out of bounds to this category of a/c!!! Anyone seen this in wrting?

NEW EASA RULE
 

Any comments on this!!!!

IAOPA-Europe is making a last-ditch attempt to stop the imposition of new regulations on private twin-engined aircraft which would make it illegal for them to land at some 900 European airfields that they have used safely for years. EASA is extending ICAO’s requirement for accelerate-stop distances for multi-engined aircraft to cover not just commercial air transport, as ICAO does, but private flights. This means that safety systems meant by ICAO to protect the paying public will now be forced upon small twins.
As a result, small twins will no longer be able to use runways which are not long enough runway to meet accelerate-stop rules which require an aircraft that has reached flying speed to be able to decelerate and stop before the end of the runway if an engine fails. IAOPA’s Jacob Pedersen argued forcefully against the EASA extension during the consultation phase, but to no avail.
The rule will force some small twin owners, already operating under a costly and onerous regulatory burden, to downgrade to singles in order to continue using their airfields. As Pedersen points out, this means they will become less safe for 99.9 percent of a flight in order to be more safe for a couple of seconds during take-off.
In September Martin Robinson met with Carl Heinz Florenz, a Euro MEP on the Transport Committee, and his advisers to discussed the accelerate-stop requirements and seek ways to get the European Commission to modify them. The figure of 900 airfields has been calculated by AOPA Germany using the Jeppesen database. For many of these airfields, light twins represent premium traffic. Companies like Hawker Beechcraft have woken up to the potential impact on sales of the European rule, for which there is no demonstrated safety need. They want Europe to adopt the ICAO recommendation, which says the accelerate-stop requirements do not apply to non-commercial piston or turbine aircraft below 5,700 kg.
Martin Robinson says: This issue also points up the lack of joined-up thinking among the members states. During the comitology stage, the French delegate voted in favour of this, while his own DGAC was arguing passionately in favour of less onerous regulation of GA. Our only recourse now is to try to get the Parliament to reject it now, although the Parliament doesn’t have a lot of say in these matters. It’s a last-ditch attempt to stave it off.”

I think the European Parliament do have a lot more say in these matters than was the case.
For that reason AOPA took on a full time lobbyist.
The damage this will do to smaller airfields not just to their own income but to the fact that owner businessmen will not be able to do business as before in smaller out of the way places.
What for? There is no demonstrated safety benefits! Take aircraft over that weight ie small business jets which do operate into smaller airfields! Do they have a bad safety record? No! Professionally flown corporate jets have an accident rate of .3 per 100,000 hrs AOC ops on the other hand have an attrocious accident rate of 3 per 100,000 hrs ten times worse than us so leave us alone please with your stupid regulations which suit no one but the regulators!

Pace

This ludicrous proposal shows just how politically vulnerable any "EASA" proposal is.

The sensible ones get easily squashed by committee chimps who have never flown a plane, and the crazy ones go through unless somebody catches them in time.

choxon

AOPA's account was a little unhelpful -- this affects turboprop twins.

Let me just clarify the terminology first. The regulation in question is Part-NCC, which applies to non-commercial operations of complex aircraft.

In EASA-speak, a complex aeroplane is one that is
* more than 5700 kg
* more than 19 seats
* a jet or multi-engine turboprop
or
* requires more than one pilot

In Part NCC, the troublesome bit is this:

NCC.POL.125 (b)
In the event of an engine failure during take-off, the pilot-in-command shall ensure that:
(1) for the aeroplane where a V1 is specified in the AFM, the aeroplane shall be able to discontinue the take-off and stop within the accelerate-stop distance available; and
(2) for the aeroplane where a net take-off flight path is specified in the AFM, the aeroplane shall be able to continue the take-off and clear all obstacles along the flight path by an adequate margin...

This has no equivalent requirement in Part-NCO, which is the part that applies to non-commercial operations of non-complex aircraft.

Presumably EASA put in the 19 seat threshold to screw Beech (King Air) which is "complex" because it is a ME TP, while favouring the Pilatus (PC12) which IIRC can be configured with up to 18 seats ;)

A typical Euro finger up to America.

No the 19 seat commuter category came from the other side of the Atlantic long before EASA had even been envisaged!

I was rather thinking of the reason for EASA using "19" in its definition of "complex".

It doesn't catch much in Europe, but protects Pilatus while enabling Beech to be screwed.

The "complex" definition crucially also appears in the requirement for EASA maintenance, for foreign-reg planes. So, an N-reg TBM or PC12 based in Europe can be maintained under FAA Part 91, whereas a King Air 90 will need both Part 91 (to comply with the State of Registry requirements) and an EASA Part M signoff.

How the EASA signoff is supposed to work I have no idea because an EASA 145 company has no legal competence on non EASA reg planes, and what happens if the aircraft has any FAA STC mods which are not EASA STC'd? It's completely meaningless.

To prove that I have absolutely nothing else to do this evening, I just started skimming through Part-NCO. Found a few things that are curious.

- If the seatbelt in an aircraft has an upper torso restraint system, it has to have a single-point release. I don't see any exception anywhere, so it seems Hooker harnesses are now illegal.

- It is illegal to smoke on board a sailplane or balloon, but in aeroplanes and helicopters (exception during refueling) that's left to the PICs discretion.

- Aeroplanes operated by more than one flight crew member (and I assume this is worded so that single pilot aircraft being used for flight training falls under this article as well) shall be equipped with a flight crew interphone system, including headsets and microphones for use by all flight crew members. That's going to be fun for the gliding fraternity.

- The documents, manuals and information [to be carried] may be available in a form other than on printed paper. Accessibility, usability and reliability should be assured. Hooray!

- I'm not quite sure, but it seems aircraft with less than 9 seats are not required to carry an installed ELT. A PLB would also suffice, and is only required for flight over water anyway. (But the rules wrt. ELTs are spread out across the whole document so it's hard to find the appropriate text.) And I found this: A personal locator beacon (PLB) should have a built-in GNSS receiver. But that last sentence might not be applicable throughout the entire document - I'm still trying to get the hang of the structure of the document.

- A means of measuring and displaying the time in hours, minutes and seconds may be a wrist watch capable of the same functions. But a "means of measuring and displaying the time" is a requirement in all types of aircraft, including gliders and balloons.

- There are fairly sensible requirements with regards to rescue equipment for flight over water. Life jackets (with integrated lights) are essentially mandatory in a lot of cases, but the rest of the equipment is left to the discretion of the PIC. And seat cushions are not considered to be flotation devices.

Except for those things, I must say I find the document well thought out. No undue regulation seems to have been imposed as a result of this. And in some cases the requirements are actually less than what's currently common.

I don't see where you get that from. NCO.IDE.A.170 seems to make carriage of an ELT or PLB mandatory on all flights. Are you perhaps reading just the AMCs & GM rather than Part-NCO itself?

I also don't see why the gliding fraternity should care about a requirement that relates only to aeroplanes.

Actually I still find it difficult to get my head around the purpose and legality of the various documents that make up Part-NCO (or Part-FCL or any of the other parts for that matter). Not being helped by the various countries that have notified a derogation period. It's extremely hard to figure out which bits apply to me, right here and now, and which bits do not.

The EASA website does't help much. They did put up a graph on how the whole document framework is built up, but did not make that graph clickable.

Edited: Now that you mention it, I checked and the intercom requirement is indeed only applicable to airplanes and helicopters, not to balloons and gliders.

Doesn't a Hooker harness have a "single point release"??

It doesn't apply to gliders, only aeroplanes and helicopters.

The rule for aeroplanes and helicopters is that a PLB can be used in place of an installed ELT "when certified for a maximum passenger seating configuration of six or less". It is required for all flights, with no "over water" criterion.

That's part of the AMC, and is therefore not mandatory. If you'd seen the alert times and location precision for GNSS vs non-GNSS PLBs, you'd never buy one without GNSS.

I don't understand the issue. It's in the AMC for all types (categories) as well, isn't it?

I wouldn't go as far as "well thought out", but it's not bad. ;)

That's an important point.

a) None of it is law yet (still in comitology)
b) AMCs in Part-NCO are not mandatory. You can satisfy the implementing rules in a different way, without any approval. See NCO.GEN.101 Means of compliance. GM is of course, never mandatory.

The 7-point Hooker harness that's used in a lot of aerobatics aircraft deliberately has a two point release. Unfortunately the Hooker site doesn't have any pictures, but Google came up with this page. You need to scroll about 9/10ths down the page to see an example.

Bucker News - Restoring F-PGLT

What does that mean? When will it become law then? And I have searched the entire EASA site for an overview that lists what Part is in what state (active law or not) and for a table of countries that have derogated implementation of the various bits, including the timelines. No luck.

Does anyone know that the time lines for implementation of EASA Parts NCO and NCC (operations for non-commercial non-complex and complex aircraft respectively) are?

Have they become law yet and if so which EU states are delaying implementation?