FAA and Regs

EAA Chairman Jack Pelton and his staff, along with advocates from AOPA and other general aviation groups, were prominent players in getting the new FAA medical rule pushed through. AVweb’s Mary Grady finds out more about how the new rule will be implemented and how it will affect CFIs, LSA pilots and others in the […]

The full text of the FAA’s new final rule on pilot medicals was published Wednesday morning in the Federal Register, as the general aviation community continued to absorb and react to the news. The final rule, which takes effect on May 1, rewrites the FAA’s rules to comply with legislation that was enacted in July […]

The FAA is working toward allowing more freedom for drone operators, and at the same time is working with NASA on a plan to develop technology that will manage drone traffic, FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said last week. Speaking at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Huerta said “the next step” in the agency’s […]

The NTSB issued a rare urgent safety recommendation on Tuesday, warning pilots that Piper PA-31T-series aircraft may have unsafe wiring that could lead to arcing and cause fires. The urgent safety recommendation is based upon preliminary findings in the ongoing investigation of the July 29, 2016, inflight breakup of a Piper PA-31T medical transport flight […]

The FAA third-class medical, which GA advocates have long lobbied against as a nuisance to pilots that does little to advance safety, has been replaced with a new option called BasicMed, FAA Administrator Michael Huerta announced on Tuesday. “The BasicMed rule will keep our pilots safe but will simplify our regulations and keep general aviation […]

An Air Force C-17 has become the latest target of a green laser attack. The crew of the big cargo plane reported they were at 4,000 feet over the Jersey Shore on Saturday when the cockpit was illuminated. No one was hurt and the aircraft continued its flight. The laser strike occurred about 9:15 p.m. […]

Three people died when a Piper Arrow and a Luscombe collided near McKinney, Texas, Saturday. The aircraft were near Aero Country Airport when they came together. One crashed onto a road and another hit a storage yard and caught fire, burning some of the goods in the yard along with the airframe. The occupants haven’t […]

At least two severely drunk airline pilots have been arrested before allegedly trying to fly passengers over the holiday period. The most recent incident was a Sunwing Airlines captain who was found passed out in the cockpit early Saturday while his flight was being boarded in Calgary, Alberta. The unidentified pilot had to be revived […]

EAA and AOPA have filed formal comments with the FAA that raise questions about the agency’s proposed Airworthiness Directive regarding certain NavWorx ADS-B units. AOPA asked the FAA to provide more information about the unit’s reported deficiencies, and to better explain the necessity for the proposed AD. “The safety benefits offered by UAT [Universal Access […]

Transport Canada has issued a Civil Aviation Safety Alert recommending owners and maintainers of virtually all older Piper Cherokees perform magnetic particle inspection of the welds on the control columns of their aircraft at the next annual. As we reported last May, a Canadian flight instructor reported the column broke off in his hands as […]