UdoR wrote:
And National Law applies everytime wherever EASA has no rule.
That is actually not the case. National law applies in areas not regulated by the EU. Aviation is regulated by the EU so no national law applies unless the EU regulations themselves permit it.
It it was as you say, then e.g. EASA rules would have to explicitly list everything that should be legal, which is obviously unreasonable.
I don’t have access to the DGAC legislation which says this as I am currently touring Italy..( off topic but Rome airport has a Mogas station just off the taxiway to.the ramp. It is really there to fuel airport vehicles but I have never seen a large petrol station plonked in the middle of an International airport, I wonder if they let me refuel the Super Guepard there.🙂)
Generally when you learn to fly in France you get both an R/T licence and French language proficiency automatically. Unless your French is really substandard.
In my TT/PPL.time we have moved from having a QRI or QRRI which were similar to the ELP but a little easier to no need for anything under JAA. You were on your honour that you could speak English or whatever language was needed to communicate with the ATS in the country you were visiting (learning English was the pragmatic solution as it was common to all ATS in all countries. Finally came EASA and the FCL1,028 and then FCL0.55.
I have lived through all of these and taken all of the necessary tests except the QRI which was for professional pilots.
With all of these changes the necessity for ELP of some kind or another, outside of the hexagon, has been a feature of all the training and in all the textbooks. I can’t ever remember looking it up in the J.O. or legislature de France or the AIP.. I have also never seen a way in France of getting an GLP, ILP, SLP etc added to my licence. It has only been ELP, and AFAIK that ties in with the EASA regs.
With all of these changes the necessity for ELP of some kind or another, outside of the hexagon, has been a feature of all the training and in all the textbooks.
Surely, the old textbook will say something like to fly foreign: you need ICAO ELP4, ICAO Class 2 medical, radio, flight plan…as these are obvious ICAO standards
Neither of these are true anymore in EASA aircraft and in some countries: already people can fly foreign say Germany-Austria without Class 2 medical (LAPL medical is enough), without ELP (German LP is enough), no filing of flight plans and no talking on radio !
I was hoping to see a legal reference that makes:
AFAIK, these flights are covered by FCL & EASA, even for homebuilts aeroplanes not regulated under FCL & EASA, we are also told LAPL privilege is enough all over the place for licencing purposes
For ULM, pas de chance: strictly speaking, you will be told in textbook that you need Class2 and ELP4 to fly in Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, which I think is true and one has to live with it: you can’t use “Basic Regulation” (FCL) for EASA aircraft (C172) unless you can pull some exemption or bilateral agreement that explicitly state sub-ICAO RT/LP and sub-ICAO medical is OK (there are few legal texts that allow flying UL/ULM between Belgium, France, Spain, Switzerland with extra conditions)
For ULM, pas de chance: strictly speaking, you will be told in textbook that you need Class2 and ELP4 to fly in Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, which I think is true and one has to live with it: you can’t use “Basic Regulation” (FCL) for EASA aircraft (C172) unless you can pull some exemption or bilateral agreement that explicitly state sub-ICAO RT/LP and sub-ICAO medical is OK (there are few legal texts that allow flying UL/ULM between Belgium, France, Spain, Switzerland with extra conditions)
This is meaningless, especially to the topic. The discussion is diffused in 10 directions all at the same time, mostly with zero information and zero references so nobody can tell if much of it is true. And most of it is not related to ELP or R/T, so we have another trashed thread.
Most people will have lost the will to live reading this.
Before I lock it, can someone explain this post which clearly states that most French pilots cannot fly abroad.
I can understand the conclusion from his research (most of the links are now dead) that most French pilots don’t have ELP and cannot do English R/T, but surely if they spoke German or Spanish they could legally fly to those two countries.
Is the often-stated understanding that you need ELP4 to cross borders not supported by any reg? I am not talking about what is practical, or undetectable.
Peter wrote:
Is the often-stated understanding that you need ELP4 to cross borders not supported by any reg?Correct, you can cross the border without ELP, if you have another LP used in radio communication. That is exactly what FCL055a states: To use the privileges of your license, you need either LP in English or the language used in radio communication.
The above is 100% correct as far as EASA regs are concerned
Most of that is true but I have no idea where you would get a German LP or a Spanish LP in France. As I mentioned before EASA and after QRRI you just flew there if you could speak the language.
I’m not so sure about Belgium AFAIK they train in English there.
@Ibra the reason I wrote that a French pilot needed an ELP to enter France was simply that if you are already flying outside the hexagon you need ELP level 4 minimum.
(Or the LP of another country which AFAIK is not available in France)
On crossing the border one can quite happily speak French for radio communication. You could of course continue in English because you have an English ELP. If you have a German LP it is not a useable language for communicating with French ATS. (You might get away with it in Eastern France) But sooner or later you would have to switch to French providing you hold (FLP) or English providing you hold (ELP).
@Ibra the LAPL medical in France is pretty much a Class2 medical. You have to go to an AME who gives you the same certificate as a Class 2 after all of the same medical tests. I have not tried to find out whether or not my past medical dossier would have any effect on getting an LAPL medical as opposed to the PPL one.
Returning to the topic you cannot circumvent R/T if you are going to use a radio in the air.
You can circumvent ELP by staying in your own country or by having the LP of the country you are flying to or over, but that would be difficult to arrange in France. And if you were to travel to more than one country you would need more than one LP.
Unless of course you have ELP which covers you in all countries so why circumvent it.
The above is all about VFR. In France to train to fly IFR you now need minimum ELP level 4 (AFAIK even if you never fly outside of France and never use it).
Most of that is true
Most of what is true? The linked post from years ago, or Frans’ post above.
Medicals are a different topic. Please don’t feed those posts.
I am quite happy to believe that the “ELP for border crossing” thing is a load of FUD which somehow arrived from Brussels and everybody bought into it. This happens a lot in GA because the regs keep changing and almost nobody knows where to find them, and even if they find them there are endless qualifications to be applied (AMCs, national variations, etc). But surprisingly some people who I know are very clever still swallowed this lock stock and barrel.
Airborne_Again wrote:
Aviation is regulated by the EU so no national law applies unless the EU regulations themselves permit it.
This is certainly not the case for Norway and Switzerland. It very seldom happens that EASA regulations are dismissed, but helicopter flying in the North Sea was an example. EASA regulations was found to be unwanted/irrelevant, and national regulations was used (by law). I think this has changed now, the EASA regulations changed, but not entirely sure.
Peter wrote:
This is meaningless, especially to the topic
If you read the topic (the headline), it doesn’t make sense. English R/T is not the same as ELP. What exactly is the topic? Is it about ELP only? It has to be, because even today, lots of people are flying with marine R/T (which also is English for international shipping 
, but no ELP exists AFAIK)
I think also the answer is not black or white. You have to know several sets of regulation, and nobody remembers all of it. It also changes continuously, and is buried in some obscure national regulations. IMO the only correct answer is: If you have ELP, you have no worries.
IMO the only correct answer is: If you have ELP, you have no worries
That sounds about right. Maybe that is the origin of it.
English R/T is not the same as ELP
The implementation is the same. “Somebody” checks you and signs you off, or in some cases you can just get it (any FAA PPL holder gets “ELP” and a British native gets ELP6 automatically. ELP is the key international/ICAO thing, which is e.g. why the FAA started putting ENGLISH PROFICIENT on their plastic card – because they knew they had to!
@bordeaux_jim has been doing these ELP signoffs in France for years.
Very significant is who has not posted here
