Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2019 March 18

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March 18

How does the FAA communicate orders?

I'm curious when the FAA grounds certain aircraft, how is that communicated to the aircraft operators? Although the recent Boeing issue triggered this question, I'm also thinking of when the DC-10 lost its type certificate in 1979 following Flight 191 crash. That is, how were all the operators of the DC-10 notified that it was no longer allowed to fly in the U.S.? RudolfRed (talk) 01:02, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

@Nimur:, you mentioned in the past that you hold a private pilot's license - do you possibly have an answer to this question? Eliyohub (talk) 13:32, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

Short answer: in cases like this, an official piece of paperwork called an Emergency Airworthiness Directive will be sent to "all known operators" through postal mail, ..."fax, letter, or other methods".

There are many official channels through which the FAA communicates to aircraft owners and operators; pilots, owners, and operators are required to know about these channels. These days, it is easy to get ADs via the internet: there is an easy-to-use Airworthiness Directives database you can find via FAA.gov. Pilots can also call or visit their nearest FAA Flight Standards District Office to talk to a real Government agent in person. Some pilots still use telephones, because we sometimes fly to places beyond the reach of the internet - in the United States and elsewhere.

For an event that has been reported in the mass-media, like the recent developments that pertain to Boeing 737 Max, FAA issued an official statement via their website, and they also issued a legal document - something called an Emergency Order. This is similar, but more urgent, than the more common paperwork called a regular Airworthiness Directive or even an "Emergency" Airworthiness Directive. Regular ADs are frequently issued for all sorts of reasons, and because they are Government paperwork, ordinary citizens and elected officials (including actual subject-matter experts) will normally get to participate in the process (!) via public inspection and comment periods, long before any rule-changes actually take legal force; but because this one is an "emergency," and because it's been so widely publicized, the FAA reached out to the operators with minimal delay.

We could quibble a lot about the definition of "emergency" as it pertains to aviation and aviation-safety. Hint: in aviation, the word "emergency" is a term with incredible legal force and important consequences that are extraordinarily clearly defined in American law, and also in aviation training textbooks like the AIM Chapter 6-1-1).... but ... the present chief officers of the executive branch of the Government believe we are in a whole bunch of emergencies, and therefore, they're exercising their authority and applying the emergency-rules.

Sometimes, an Airworthiness Directive is very simple and is not related to any emergency. In those cases, the FAA has determined that the timeframe for compliance can wait until the next scheduled maintenance cycle, where an approved maintenance-person will verify that all the paperwork is in order.

The mix gets a little more tricky when the operator is international or is an American operator outside of the United States, but you can generally get the impression that the FAA knows how to track us. In fact, per 14 CFR 61.60, individual pilots have to tell the Government where they live. Big corporate operators have similar requirements to make sure that the FAA can find them - anywhere they are - if the need actually comes up.

Nimur (talk) 19:16, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

@Nimur: Thanks! RudolfRed (talk) 19:37, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

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thanks.Rich (talk) 19:50, 22 March 2019 (UTC)