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ECAC Status for homebuilt / experimental (flight privileges within Europe)

Does the ECAC agreement (mentioned earlier) on Permits cover Spain?

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Does the ECAC agreement (mentioned earlier) on Permits cover Spain?

I believe the situation for Spain and Portugal is as in the LAA leaflet

That is you have to get written permission. Last time I tried they responded with a few days to spare after I emailed a month in advance.

The good news is that they don’t charge for the permission.

KHWD- Hayward California; EGTN Enstone Oxfordshire, United States

OK… I was aware of that LAA leaflet and indeed I have posted it here several times in these discussions.

The reason for my Spain question was that we have

  • One poster here saying repeatedly that the ECAC agreement means (paraphrasing) homebuilts can fly all over Europe
  • Lots of other pilots telling me privately that Spain requires a permission and responds late or never

So I am trying to get to the bottom of what is really happening.

As far as I can tell (and many pilots have told me this privately) the ECAC agreement has been disregarded by most countries ever since it was drawn up in the 1980s. But I have never found a clear reference to that, and the agreement “hangs out” on many websites and other places. All the indications are that the LAA document is the correct one to follow i.e. if you want to fly all over Europe you need to obtain a permit for just about everywhere.

My interest in this is that I may buy a homebuilt one day.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

There seems to be some misunderstanding here. ECAC issued a recommendation regarding homebuilts flying internationally, not an agreement. ECAC’s members are not under any obligation to abide by the recommendation and many do not.

Roughly half the number of members of ECAC adhere more or less to the terms of the recommendation. That does not in effect include some notable countries such as the UK or France. UK/France flights are the subject of a bilateral agreement and there are various other bilateral arrangements. Spain and Portugal do not adhere to the ECAC recommendation at all, permission is required. In the past Spanish permissions were issued only after long delays, this seems to have changed with a new system in 2015.

A couple of years ago EFLEVA prodded ECAC into doing a survey of the latter’s members, resulting in a country by country table of requirements.

Bluebeard
EIKH, Ireland

Many thanks for the input, Bluebeard

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

A couple of years ago EFLEVA prodded ECAC into doing a survey of the latter’s members, resulting in a country by country table of requirements

Is that table published somewhere?

EIWT Weston, Ireland

I don’t know whether EFLEVA’s results have been published, but they were made available to its members such as LAA, RSA etc.

I’ll make enquiries about its public availability ……………………

Bluebeard
EIKH, Ireland

I have compiled a quick and easy readable (I hope) list of countries regarding the implementation status of the ECAC INT.S/11-2 recommendation from 1980. The recommendation is about free flight of homebuilt aircraft between ECAC states.

The official list and status can be found here.

The recommendation states:

The Conference recommends that Member States accept Home-Built Aircraft with a certificate of airworthiness or a “permit to fly” issued by another Member State, to fly in their country without any restrictions other than those stated in the certificate of airworthiness or “permit to fly”.

The compiled list only includes if the recommendation is included and with eventual restrictions regarding VFR and IFR (since this always seems to pop up as a topic here). It is important to note that the ECAC recommendation does not involve or include any local rules or regulations regarding operations and building of homebuilt aircraft, only the acceptance of operations by a hombuilt aircraft registered in another ECAC state.

The list is here.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

That’s a great summary, LeSving.

However, isn’t there another “dimension” in that e.g. a D-reg homebuilt can stay in the UK for a certain time (few months?) but an N-reg homebuilt can stay in the UK for a different time (28 days IIRC).

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Maybe, I don’t know. An N-reg homebuilt is not relevant here, strictly speaking, since the USA is not an ECAC state.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway
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