This has just appeared on the CAA website.
Valid until 15th April 2017. What the hell is going on, and what is supposed to happen between today and 15th April?
I asked my contact where he gets this stuff from so fast. He says he uses “Skywise CAA app”.
Does any of this affect aircraft “operators” from the Isle of Man, or from Norway?
Guys it is a declaration not an application. It is a pain but I think you fill it in, file it and then they can ask whatever they like.
Seven whole days to get home from a two-week holiday or business trip, upgrade from Class 3 to a Class 2 medical, organise a familiarisation flight and signature from CAA examiner, make copies of documents, obtain paper BFR endorsement…
So what’s to winge about? 
Sure, the timing is a disaster but if this is what will be required under BASA or the UK-US aviation treaty….then it is a long-term good outcome.
The way this whole thing was sprung on us is a disaster – a total cockup. The documents are so badly drafted they mean little – except to achieve a high scare factor. So there is really not much we can conclude from them, except what “might” be coming.
It sounds like there was a DfT conference yesterday and they announced it in the conference. But the documents are written to sound like non-compliance (as of tomorrow!) makes all flight illegal, which might be true in some countries with dodgy legal systems but for sure it would not work in the UK criminal justice system. Even for insurance purposes – usually the real limiting factor – I would not worry about this too much.
What will ground much of the N-reg community is the requirement for the Class 2 medical. It looks like FAA or EASA one will do the job, but there are people who can’t get the Class 2. So I hope this is a cockup. For me this is no issue currently but I am old enough to be aware of the situation of many others who are obviously not going to post about it.
Frankly, compared to the so-called aviation authorities sitting in London, the people in Cologne seem a lot more competent and make EASA look a lot more attractive than ever before.
Could it be that some people in the CAA are trying to hone their legislative skills and mark their territory pending what they hope will be an EASA brexit?
Well, many people have left the UK CAA in recent years, and it is always the most competent who leave first. The UK criminal justice system remains functional, fortunately, so unworkable regs can’t be enforced.
One Brexit related dimension might be that the UK can now negotiate its own FCL treaty – the one which the EU has for years been unable to agree to – with the FAA. And all civil servants love getting involved with treaties. You get lots of foreign travel with 1st Class airline tickets, promotion, etc. Obviously this point won’t be lost on the CAA+DfT so I would be amazed if they aren’t looking into it.
Peter wrote:
The UK criminal justice system remains functional, fortunately, so unworkable regs can’t be enforced.
Would the enforcement of such a regulation a criminal justice question? I’m not intimately familiar with the British legal system, but I believe that in my country it would totally be an administrative issue, possibly with civil court involvement if there was some monetary damage done.
Would the enforcement of such a regulation a criminal justice question?
AFAIK, absolutely yes.
A recent list is here. As you can see, the stuff we are discussing here is practically never prosecuted; the cases are mostly much more “obvious” stuff. However that list is not complete (it shows only successful prosecutions)… I have some email correspondence on the background but nothing which can be posted as yet.
Whether a specific offence creates a “criminal record” for you is a different matter. Just doing 45 in a 30 limit won’t. Drunken driving will. @timothy will know the detail…
However any associated insurance issue (insurer not paying out if a flight was illegal, etc) is a civil matter. There is some relationship between criminal and civil e.g. if you get convicted of a criminal offence then it is much easier to get sued by victims for compensation, etc.
In all these things, it would be the insurance that would worry me, not the criminal offence angle.
