As a further example, In Italy, SERA goes into effect tomorrow.
Like many other countries, they don’t just apply SERA, but they added another (national) regulation on top of that, in this case the “Rules of the Air Italy” ("RAIT).
The end result unfortunately is what we are also seeing in the UK, in Germany, etc.: lots of exceptions and gold plating. This AIC sums it up.
1.They don’t adopt the East-West semicircular cruising levels, but stick with their North-South rule.
2. They want to require pilots to file a full flight plan for every flight that crosses a piece of controlled airspace(!). AOPA Italy is raging against that at the moment and they might succeed in turning things around.
3. They do adopt the “new” nighttime definitions as per SERA (unlike Germany, which will stick with SS+30/SS-30).
4. Special VFR will require a minimum ground visibility. That means that when the airport served by the CAS is “socked in” in merely some low fog, it will not be possible to receive a clearance to cross the CTR under VFR even at say 2000 feet, in the sunshine.
Germany will, among others, keep the 2000-feet rule. The UK will keep certain other national rules and France has announced the same thing. So, in the end, SERA turns out to become a big mess. In future, pilots will need to comply with both SERA and any national regulation. I mean, to be honest, this was predictable. It’s how Europe works with everything. People start “harmonizing” things just for the sake of it. The end result is the so called “lowest common denominator”, which is a set of base rules that introduce a lot of problems/new restrictions in many places, yet isn’t sufficiently universal to cover everything. Hence, in addition, national gold-plating.
The least we could expect would be a (single) “European” document that lists all national deviations from SERA, which would make European flight planning on the “regulations level” a breeze. Still, I have very little hope that we will ever see that.
They want to require pilots to file a full flight plan for every flight that crosses a piece of controlled airspace(!).
Was it not a requirement of the SERA that a flight plan would be required for all flights entering controlled airspace? I thought I remembered reading that.
Yes, but SERA said that a flight plan call also mean a radio message with reduced info. Italy said no, but again, AOPA Italy is currently at it.
What is the Irish twist on that DP? I know that in the past, they required a flightplan for any flight into controlled airspace. Are they going to allow the “reduced” flightplan via radio in the future?
Doesn’t a lot of Europe require a full FP for all CAS? Spain does, for example. Greece does for every flight anywhere.
Portugal and Ireland I think also require full flight plans for flight in CAS.
What is the new SERA night time? I wasn’t aware there was a change to this.
Well, I said “new” because some countries (Germany, Italy for example) operated SS+30/SS-30, whereas others (Austria, Switzerland for example) operated on ECET.
SERA defined that ECET shall be the dividing line between day and night, and whilst Italy adopted this change, Germany said no and will maintain the SS+30/SS-30 rule.
Doesn’t a lot of Europe require a full FP for all CAS?
Not really, because in light GA terms, Germany, Switzerland, France and UK are “most” of Europe.
What is the Irish twist on that DP? I know that in the past, they required a flightplan for any flight into controlled airspace.
No change. Any flight into controlled airspace will still require a flight plan.
Having said that, there are plenty of local concessions. For example, most airports apart from Dublin (and possibly Shannon) are happy for you to depart without a flight plan, or are happy for you to do a flight that doesn’t land elsewhere, without a flight plan. (I gues it helps them avoid a mass of flight plans with the same registration from the flight schools).
What is the new SERA night time? I wasn’t aware there was a change to this.
Civil Twilight if I remember correct.
Portugal and Spain require a flight plan for every flight….not a big deal, 30 mins for VFR F/P and 1hr IFR F/P
Quatrelle, not true. Only for controlled airspace.
