Yes, so I see. Extremely strange there is nothing to be found about this in any Norwegian sites, and no mention in any magazines, nothing.
It doesn’t look like I have been very updated about the current rules. The current rules say all night flying in controlled airspace is to be IFR. VFR night is only an option in G and after special permission in controlled airspace (but routinely given, as far as I can understand). From the hearings it looks indeed like 5005 C (5) is to be taken as is. There LT say the “general rule” today is all night flying shall be IFR, but with exceptions. With the new rules VFR night will be allowed according to SERA 5005 C (5) as a general rule and no differentiation of airspaces apparently.
Airborne Again, looks like you are right about this. The new rules does not differentiate between airspaces, but allows VFR night as written in SERA, basically IFR minimum altitudes. It will be interesting to see how approaches and departures are to be done with those regulations at controlled airfields and mountains all around. They would have to make new maps or have some special rules in the TMA and control zones.
I just found an earlier thread (http://www.euroga.org/forums/vfr-night-under-sera/2367) about SERA night VFR mimimum heights with a posting from a Norwegian ATCO. Apparently he (and the Norwegian ATCO guild) interprets the minimum height rule in the same way as I do…
“except when necessary for takeoff and landing”.
Of course. 
That makes more sense. Night VFR is something I would like to do. Fly across snowy mountains in the moonlight…. I was afraid all bets suddenly were out, I could not believe what I read
@LeSving: it is not possible to maintain 500" AGL when landing during daytime either. That is why the regulation says “except when necessary for takeoff and landing”.
The way that the minimum VFR altitudes at night are formulated is compliant with what I learned in Norway in the late 1990s. Frankly, given how little you can actually see at night, those rules are not unreasonable to avoid WTF moments.
(f) is the general rule and for night VFR (c)5(i)/(ii) should be applied instead. I really can see no other reasonable interpretation of the rules. If (f) should be applied to night VFR as well, then what’s the point of even including (c)5(i)/(ii)??
I have no idea, but 5005 c clearly say: “(5) except when necessary for take-off or landing, or except when specifically authorised by the competent authority, a VFR flight at night shall be flown at a level which is not below the minimum flight altitude established by the State whose territory is overflown, or , where no such minimum flight altitude has been established -—”
The minimum flight altitude established by the sate of Norway is 500 feet, and has been so for at least 25 years, and will continue to be so with SERLA. But Norway has 3 exception to (f): Gliders can go to 150 feet when flying hang. When training emergency landings there are no minimum. Helicopters doing aerial work. Maybe other states may chose to delete (f) altogether, and in that case (c)5(i) and (ii) applies for me when flying there? Besides, 1 and 2000 feet above the highest obstacle within 8 km radius will make it impossible to land at most places in Norway at night, unless you do it IFR. I would not be able to fly night VFR at ENVA for instance, and even though LT has done strange things in the past, I cannot for the best of it believe they would do such a thing.
500 feet it is, (c)5(i and ii) would be impossible to implement here.
What a joke. “Standardised”….. Sure.
It’s become a mess, as could be expected!
The Danish Transport Authority announced an adjusted set of rules to supplement SERA, which will be in force in Denmark from December 4th. It was announced that there was no intention to change anything compared to recent Danish regulations. However, in the documents sent for consultation, the authorities had missed several important implications of SERA, e.g. increase of minimum visibility from 3 km (below 140 KIAS) to 5 km in airspace G; and they also missed the radical changes of rules that SERA imposed on VFR night flight.
After Danish AOPA responded to this, the Danish set of rules were adjusted. We shall keep the 3 km minimum visibility requirement in airspace G (< 140 KIAS). As for VFR night, things were more complicated. SERA implies that IFR minimum altitudes will also apply for VFR at night, making most VFR night flights including night training very impractical. Even minor obstacles in a control zone will mean that night VFR flights will have to fly up into the TMAs with resulting added workload to ATC and potential conflicts with commercial traffic.
AOPA has not (yet) succeeded in persuading DTA to make use of the text in 5005(c)(5) about minimum altitudes. (States have established minimum flight heights (500 ft generally), but not minimum altitudes.) The worthing “specifically authorized by the authority” has been taken to mean “not generally”, and could be relevant for e.g. exempting one or two obstacles from the 8 km distance requirement, but not all of them. That is a pity. However, the authority has not refused to discuss the subject again later.
But this means that (i) and (ii) will apply in SERA.5005(C)(5). (I believe Airborne Again is quite right in this interpretation.)
E.g., wthin 8 km of a (specific) 1200 ft MSL obstacle, minimum flight altitude VFR at night will be 2200 ft, even with terrain below 200 ft. Compared to now, where minimum altude is only 6-700 ft in the same area. As there is often IFR traffic approaching Kastrup at 3000 ft in the area I am thinking of, VFR night flight will be restricted in that area, for no reason other than bureaucracy.
AOPA persuaded DTA to make use of the option to use special VFR in control zones. [SERA.5010(b)(1)] This will now be allowed but only if the cloud base is 1100 ft or more. Apparently this has been harmonized with Swedish authorities. EASA has not described special VFR at night anywhere in SERA.
Another problem for Danish GA pilots introduced by the implementation of SERA is the arrangement of rule documents. Besides having to read SERA (lex EU) and its AMC (EASA-doc), they also have to read the old Danish rules-of-the-air document, which has now been altered to partly exempt Denmark, but not Greenland (non-EASA), from present national rules; and then there is a new document describing the national supplements referring to SERA (night VFR etc.). DTA is understaffed and has undoubtedly done this to quickly make the paperwork valid from a lawyers point of view, but ordinary GA pilots are left without a chance in the world to know where to look to really understand the law they have to obey.
(f) is the general rule and for night VFR (c)5(i)/(ii) should be applied instead. I really can see no other reasonable interpretation of the rules. If (f) should be applied to night VFR as well, then what’s the point of even including (c)5(i)/(ii)??
The only way I can come to your conclusion is if Norwegian national legislation somewhere says that the VFR minimum altitude is 500 ft AGL and you understand that to be a “minimum flight altitude established by the State whose territory is overflown”
SERA itself says 500 ft is the minimum, and from November 13 this is the only legislation available about this. I think, unless we have several legislation for minimum height, which would be rather strange, and I can’t remember anything else except the current BSL F 1-1 which will be replaced by SERA as a new BSL F 1-1.
SERA 5005
(f) Except when necessary for take-off or landing, or except by permission from the competent authority, a VFR flight
shall not be flown:
(1) over the congested areas of cities, towns or settlements or over an open-air assembly of persons at a height less
than 300 m (1 000 ft) above the highest obstacle within a radius of 600 m from the aircraft;
(2) elsewhere than as specified in (1), at a height less than 150 m (500 ft) above the ground or water, or 150 m
(500 ft) above the highest obstacle within a radius of 150 m (500 ft) from the aircraft.
So I guess 500 ft it is.
