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Flying Experimental across Atlantic and in the EU

Peter wrote:

Another story, an Evolution flown USA to South Africa, is here

Peter – you provided guidance to the Mother Lode. I’m clicking on links and got to this ferry item. The pilot for this airplane also provided my initial transition training in the EVO. Wonderful gentleman and superb pilot. He and I will be talking this week.

Please one small sidenote. It’s exactly that, but many ECAC memberstates allow entry of foreign Homebuilts on the basis of bileteral agreements, so no further application is needed in practice. However there can be further limitations in these general permissions like e. g. VFR only. “Paperwork” is simply an application form and a document (permission) from the CAA, at least in Northern-/Western Europe. Sometimes ( e.g. Spain) it’s only the application, because the CAA doesn’t answer. If you fly routes on a regular basis, it’s all not that difficult and you have to prepare the flight anyway, don’t you?

Last Edited by europaxs at 15 Jan 06:55
EDLE

Silvaire wrote:

each individual European country that this aircraft flies through has to allow the transit and within that approval they must not add a limitation on IFR in their airspace. Is that the basics?

That is EXACTLY it. Because an “experimental” aircraft has no ICAO C of A, any country needs to explicitly allow entry, and can impose whatever restrictions they want.

The way there rules work:

  • Under ICAO, every country has absolute sovereignty of their airspace, but…
  • The ICAO states agreed to allow entry and overflight for foreign aircraft with an ICAO compliant certificate of airworthiness flown by a crew with ICAO compliant licences complying with ICAO compliant operating rules. There are some restrictions for commercial flying that are irrelevant here.
  • In theory, every country can put in place it own restrictions, but in practice few do – for example, the EASA requirement for EASA licences for pilots flying foreign-registered aircraft for an EASA based operator is such a restriction which is not ICAO compliant, but each country can do whatever they want, and the EU and other EASA member states have decided to do so.

If you don’t have an ICAO compliant C of A, you are on your own… although in most cases, it is only annoying paperwork, and you might get annoying restrictions, which has been done to death.

The other big differences is that countries publish ICAO differences more-or-less diligently in their AIPs, but the local rules for non-ICAO aircraft can be very hard to find.

Last Edited by Cobalt at 14 Jan 20:53
Biggin Hill

This ferry has been done before by the two Evolutions in Europe.

One story is referenced here although that article was removed from the Lancair website at least a year ago and now the website domain itself is gone.

The second one, now in the former USSR, was not documented anywhere AFAIK.

Another story, an Evolution flown USA to South Africa, is here

The above flights pretty obviously all flew IFR all the way, for reasons to do with fuel flow and Class A airspace over some N Atlantic areas. I have no idea what permits were obtained and how. There are various overflight agents out there (I have the details of several here) but their normal work is getting permits for certified aircraft flying to the “3rd World”, most of which requires them, not getting individual-country permits for homebuilts, for which one applies to the national CAAs, some of which are known to almost never respond.

I think most people would say this kind of ferry work is something you “just do”… as with much human activity if you are on the move the whole time, nobody is likely to notice you, and I am not going to spell out the obvious caveat yet again.

The Evo which is in Bulgaria, for sale, which appeared in some thread here, was shipped as an unbuilt kit to Russia – according to a Lancair kit dealer (I didn’t know there were dealers for kits!) who posted on the Lancair forum in 2016.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Isn’t the situation that the legality of this plan can be divided into two categories, one being any IFR etc limitations specified in the aircraft Certificate of Airworthiness (none for this FAA registered plane), and the second being limitations specified for use of a foreign non-ICAO C of A aircraft in national airspace? If that’s true and if there is no pan-European law covering non-certified foreign aircraft in pan-European airspace, it means each individual European country that this aircraft flies through has to allow the transit and within that approval they must not add a limitation on IFR in their airspace. Is that the basics? Maybe that is all obvious but nobody wrote it down above.

Anyway if that’s correct it’s a discrete individual situation for every country and its no wonder nobody in this forum can give clear information. I wonder how Don Tayor dealt with this when he flew his T-18 homebuilt around the world 40 years ago, including IFR flights? As far as I can tell the basic legal situation is unchanged since then.

AnthonyQ wrote:

are you planning to get the ThermX system installed?

Probably not – at least not yet decided. I had ThermaWing on our Columbia 400. Probably used it 10 times in 5 years. Only really needed it twice in those 10.

We/I decided to pre-wire for ThermX (same electronics as ThermaWing but different leading edge panels due to wing curve) but not install. We used the 400 while employed but now using the EVO in retirement. No ‘mission critical’ departures now. I have only aborted one mission in 1.5 years with the EVO.

Very nice plane, pdherrington

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

I’m afraid I can’t offer you any practical advice but your trip sounds amazing and I hope that you do indeed manage to do it and that you tell us all about it.
It would be nice if you could factor in a visit to a fly-in so you could meet lots of local pilots.

Forever learning
EGTB

Beautiful airplane PH… are you planning to get the ThermX system installed?

YPJT, United Arab Emirates

Thanks much for the tips and referrals.

If all goes well, N188PT will be out and about in Europe sometime this summer. Fingers Crossed!


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