Quote of the day (courtesy of our FX provider, Moneycorp):
Jean-Louis Bourlanges, a French professor and one-time member of the European Parliament, neatly summed up the effect of the Brexit vote: "Before, the UK had one foot in and one foot out of the EU. Afterwards, it will be exactly the opposite.
With humour almost worthy of Voltaire, I suspect that Prof. Bourlanges has predicted the net effect of Brexit on European GA.
One thing which Germans planning to move their planes from D-reg to G-reg (to avoid the Cessna SIDs) ought to be aware of:
There is a provision in the German law saying that one can leave the EU without stopping at a customs airport provided one has nothing to declare, the flight is private and the aircraft registered in the Community
According to § 3 paragraph 3 ZollV, aircraft directly leaving the Community and with them the transported goods are exempted from the requirement of using a customs airfield as far as the requirements of articles 231 or 232 paragraph 2 of the customs codex implementation order (ZK-DVO) are met. This for example is true for departing aircraft that are registered within the customs area of the Community and destined to return as well as merchandise in the personal luggage of travellers as far as not in violation of other regulations.
So this little known German concession (so little known that nobody I have ever heard of seems to have heard of it 
) will be lost once you are no longer D-reg.
The concession is Customs, not Immigration, so it covers flights to Switzerland, Norway, etc.
In this context (aircraft and vehicles in general), “Zugelassen” is registered. The certificate of registration in German is called “Zulassungsurkunde” etc.
Cobalt wrote:
The certificate of registration in German is called “Zulassungsurkunde”
In Germany, to be correct. In Switzerland, it’s called Eintragungszeugnis in german 
Cobalt wrote:
In this context (aircraft and vehicles in general), “Zugelassen” is registered. The certificate of registration in German is called “Zulassungsurkunde” etc.
Jeden Tag lernt man was neues!
From the latest IAOPA e-news:
“Brexit” and General Aviation
By Martin Robinson, CEO of AOPA UK
So the voters decided that leaving the European Union was the best thing to do for the future of Britain.
Personally, I have mixed views but, on balance, I think being in Europe and renegotiating how Europe should service its citizens would have been the correct thing to do.
The UK will still be part of the EASA system, which means that for many aircraft owners, flying clubs and pilots there will be no change.
In fact, the UK will be in a similar position to Norway and Switzerland in that we will no longer be able to influence proposed rules, but will still have to comply with them.
So, what’s the point in leaving?
I find it strange that arguments were being made about “unelected officials in Brussels making up the rules,” and unaccountable individuals telling us what we have to do.
Well, it is the same in Whitehall – the Civil Service advises Government on many topics from schools to the NHS, and from roads to airports.
Do not be fooled into thinking that we will have more say with our own system – we do not.
I could quote many examples, but it is probably best left unsaid.
In some ways GA may be OK, because we have already been through lots of changes, but what we do not know is how our freedom of movement may be affected.
However, our ability to influence directly the Regulations and rules that affect us in aviation will unfortunately diminish over the next two years.
Now a simple Scottish peasant checking his Texel cross gimmers from the window of his Maule (thanks, for the time being, to the lavish Common Agricultural Policy “support” bestowed upon him by generous German taxpayers) could easily get confused about the membership rules, functions and merits of:
But how much of what Mr Robinson writes is fact, and how much is Stockholm syndome -inspired defeatist hogwash?
Is there really any sense in which the UK could be “part of the EASA system” if we don’t join EFTA upon leaving the EU?
If we do join EFTA (and are thereby entitled to a voting membership of the EASA management board), should we accept?
What has EASA done for UK GA (apart from encouraging us to retain our IMC rating and establishing “Common Rules of the Air” which each Member State can apply with differences?
If (as currently mooted) we don’t join EFTA, to which bilateral agreement should we give priority: UK-US or UK-EASA?
Which of the other euro-alphabet-soup bodies is worth the gas it produces, and why?
I agree Jacko; after all these years UK AOPA would do well to get someone fresh to run it.
Someone who is able to bang some heads together, too. This is what I am getting at. Most of the GA organisations here are run by highly “colourful” characters who, in the volunteer-run organisations (who are desperately short of candidates for any position) are unstoppable in their rise to the top while they p1ss off everybody around them.
As regards what EASA has done that’s useful… up to very recently (when they got a new broom in there) the clear answer was: very little. The only useful thing I can think of was the grandfathering of European certification from country-specific to pan-EASA (but this was grossly devalued by the lack of a central database of existing approvals). That was done in 2003… then we got 10 years of arrogant useless rubbish regulation.
We now have the CB IR, which goes some way to delivering a more accessible private IR but even that is crippled (mostly by FTO industry pressure) compared to the FAA option.
The EASA FCL attack on N-regs – a great piece of vaguely worded FUD – has not been repealed by Mr Ky. But maybe having that in place and have it postponed every year is less destructive than some totally mad local DIY approach like the France/UK ones proposed in 2004/05.
The UK CAA is unlikely to unwind EASA regs in a big way, but they are likely to exercise a greater freedom in some areas. The CAA does try to keep people flying where EASA would stop them – e.g. getting an IR without the two-ear audiogram (a “secret” concession which very few AMEs know about), a day-only IR for CVD pilots (another “secret” option, always possible in the UK but banned under JAA).
In the end, EASA was never going to take the UK to the European court over some relative trivia (the Spanish bullfighting scenario – “politics is the art of the possible”) and now there will be extra leeway. That is a good thing.
I was very disappointed that the Single Rules of the Air turned out to be anything but single.
But do the British not remember how much they hated the CAA until recently? It’s only since the CAA effectively became a field office of EASA, that it started to look at GA in a positive manner. For most of my flying time, I’ve been hearing people moan continuously about the UK CAA. It’s only in the last 3 years that anyone has anything positive to say.
Don’t look at the past and think everything was rosy before EASA, or you’ll quickly come to the conclusion that you’ve turned into an old fuddy duddy where “things were better in my day!”
I’m not sure whether it was becoming EASA’s poodle or the butt-kicking administered by the Rt Hon Grant Shapps MP in the form of the GA Red Tape Challenge which caused the UK CAA to smell coffee in the last couple of years.
Maybe it was a bit of both, but the poodle is struggling to deliver any meaningful results of the GARTC while wearing EASA’s collar and leash.
