EU expands Bilateral Aviation Safety Agreement with the United States to cover pilot licences and flight simulators
19/11/2020
The European Union und the United States of America today signed two new Annexes to the Agreement on Cooperation in the Regulation of Civil Aviation Safety (BASA), expanding its areas of application to allow the conversion of pilot licences and to reduce duplication in the oversight of flight simulators.

On pilot licencing, the new Annex will ensure that pilots residing in the EU fly aircraft on the basis of licences and ratings issued in accordance with EU regulations, under the oversight of EU Member States. It will also ensure that they maintain and develop their qualifications via EU training organisations. The objective of the new Annex is to convert certain US pilot licences into EU Part-FCL licences and ratings, while taking account of the similarities between the US and EU regulatory systems. This is a cost-effective solution to converting FAA pilot licences into EU Part-FCL licences. Several thousand EU pilots are expected to take advantage of the new provisions and complete the conversion of their FAA pilot licences and ratings.

The second new BASA Annex, on flight simulation training devices, will allow for the reciprocal acceptance of findings of compliance, as well as documentation, on the recurrent evaluation and qualification of EU- and U.S.-based full flight simulators. It will generate resource savings, in particular by eliminating duplicate evaluations by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The aviation industry will also see costs fall: the operators of flight simulation training devices will no longer be subject to multiple re-evaluations, and these savings can be passed on to air carriers sending pilots for training.

Expanding the scope of the BASA between the EU and the United States marks another key deliverable under the Commission’s Aviation Strategy for Europe – designed to generate growth for European business, foster innovation and offer passengers safer, cleaner and cheaper flights.

In addition to the new Annexes, the EU and the U.S. agreed on an amendment of the BASA annex on maintenance to allow that maintenance organisations from all EU Member States can participate in the safety cooperation as provided by the BASA framework and confirming the highest EU aviation safety standards as well the oversight role of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (‘EASA’).

The new Annexes will enter into force as of today.

More information
Agreement between the United States of America and the European Community on Cooperation in the Regulation of Civil Aviation Safety (BASA): https://www.easa.europa.eu/document-library/bilateral-agreements/eu-usa
New Annex on pilot licensing: https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-11004-2019-INIT/en/pdf
New Annex on flight simulation training devices: https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-11009-2019-INIT/en/pdf

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https://www.easa.europa.eu/sites/default/files/dfu/tip-l_final_signe.pdf

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FAA, European Commission Agree to New Areas of Collaboration

The Federal Aviation Administration(FAA) and European Commission (EC) demonstrated their continued commitment to collaboration and aviation safety improvement during the 14^th meeting of the Bilateral Oversight Board, co-chaired by Ali Bahrami, the FAA’s Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety. 

The FAA and the EC signed four decisions to the U.S.-EU Safety Agreement. Two of the decisions adopted additional annexes to the original agreement for pilot licensing and flight simulators. The new annexes are new areas of collaboration between the FAA and EC. They reflect the completion of a multi-year effort to allow reciprocal acceptance of certain approvals in those areas and implement the expanded scope of the cooperative efforts agreed by the FAA and EC in December 2017.

The first decision establishes an annex that facilitates the conversion of FAA and European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) private pilot certificates, airplane ratings and instrument ratings. Currently, up to 9,000 European residents hold FAA pilot certificates.

The second decision establishes an annex that allows the FAA and EU or Member State authorities to conduct recurrent evaluations on Flight Simulation Training Devices on each other’s behalf in the U.S. and in Europe.  

These annexes reduce duplication and leverage FAA and EU resources, which allows both agencies to allocate resources to higher safety-risk areas. The streamlined procedures and reduced costs will benefit industry, government and the flying public. 

The third decision allows technicians certificated by all EU aviation authorities to perform maintenance on civil aeronautical products. The final decision restores a reduction in the fees that EASA charges U.S. manufacturers for basic design changes on U.S. aerospace products.