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Will SERA airspace regs apply to homebuilts, VFR and IFR?

Currently AFAIK the basing and overflight regs are all buried variously deep in national laws.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Of course. It will apply to everyone. Even, for example, paragliders. It’s a regulation, doesn’t matter who buried what where.

I thought SERA was more about the practical rules once you’re airborne (e.g. cloud clearances, airspace types) rather than where Annex-2 aircraft can be based or flown.

Andreas IOM

from the UK CAA website
SERA

SERA applies to every aircraft operating in EU airspace regardless of type or state of registration. But as the rules will not cover all aspects of the Rules of the Air, Member States may keep supplementary rules that complement SERA. They may also permit routine operations such as VFR flight at night, and grant exemptions from SERA’s requirements.

But some states try to go around that.
France wants to keep its overflying rules but they are not SERA compliant (I think there was a discussion about this somewhere on EuroGA already)

Last Edited by PapaPapa at 14 Mar 15:29
ELLX (Luxembourg), Luxembourg

I should think the “Single” bit says it all? Or did the S stand for “Standardised”? Even so…

Last Edited by at 14 Mar 16:08
EBZH Kiewit, Belgium

PapaPapa wrote:

But some states try to go around that.
France wants to keep its overflying rules but they are not SERA compliant (I think there was a discussion about this somewhere on EuroGA already)

If “overflying rules” mean what I think they do (flight permissions), then that has nothing to do with SERA. SERA are about traffic rules and not about permissions.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

The single in SERA is something of a misnomer as there are various regulations which allow the local “Competent Authority” (i.e. UK CAA and its equivalents) to make local rules. So for example in the UK, the CAA has issued a local rule reverting the VFR low flying limit from SERA (not below height 500 feet) to the same as the old Rule 5 (not closer than 500 feet to any person, vessel or structure). I have been researching SERA recently in some depth both for work and to try to help fellow syndicate members. The whole thing is a mess. I have raised this formally with UK CAA and the best they can do at the moment is to point enquiries to their website and a consolidation which they told me is “not authoritative”. Not only that but the consolidation just runs the various documents together clause by clause and leaves the reader to work-out the end result. As I pointed out to them, I can just about manage this as part of my job but this is a potential safety problem since if the rules of the air are unfathomable for normal people there is potential for it to cause accidents. Allegedly, an easy to read “Skyway Code” will be published later this year to try to help ease the situation.

strip near EGGW

In Norway SERA applies to everything moving in the air. Part NCO does however only apply to EASA certified aircraft atm. We have separate regulations for all other (ANNEX II) Aircraft. A couple of years ago they said this would change within a few months. Nothing has happened yet, and this is usually because EASA has something more up the sleeves, probably regarding ANNEX II.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

PapaPapa wrote:

France wants to keep its overflying rules but they are not SERA compliant

IIRC SERA does open up for MS to deviate from the minimum altitudes for overflight of populated areas – but I am not going to look it up now. I am sure this concession was made at the request of the French.

LFPT, LFPN

Correct. SERA says:

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.

Given that, it is very surprising that Germany dropped its 2000 feet rule for VFR flights, which used to be the holy grail of VFR regulation around here…I would never have thought they would do that (I think there is a post somewehere from a couple of years ago where I said that Germany would never drop that rule, even if it were a breach of SERA… )

Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany
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