Since I am thoroughly licensed in this country, I can say that I am intimately familiar with regulations, policies, training, requirements, information, etc.
The FAA's web portal is here:
http://www.faa.gov/
Federal Aviation Administration's Website
2 posts • Page 1 of 1
Re: Federal Aviation Administration's Website
by Robbie » 04 Feb 2010 21:12
The newest changes to Parts 61, 91, and 141
The Federal Aviation Administration issued massive changes to Pilot, Flight Instructor, and Pilot School Certification rules in late August that took effect 20 October 2009. These changes, coupled with poor dissemination due to ASA's publishing schedule have had a poor uptake by the general aviation community, the sector of industry that uses these rules most.
Now, I can't honestly say that it's wholly the FAA's fault that the instructors that depend and should be familiar with these changes haven't really done that. I've come to learn through my dealings with the government, that contrary to popular belief, they do actually publish these things in places that you can access them. However, I think the FAA could have done a better job in making the changes a bit more visible; the only way that I found out about them was from the FSDO when some documentation I'd been working on was slow to move through the Administration. I ended up stumbling upon these little gems by going to the FAA website, clicking on regulations, and then finding, right there on top, a little link that pointed me to the the Federal Register.
These changes, which include such things as duration of student pilot certificates, changes to logging PIC, changes the requirements for instrument ratings to be more in line with ICAO, and other various changes to certification time requirements, are far-reaching in scope, but don't seem to be realized by most instructors I've spoken with.
Within the Federal Register, I printed a 71 page document that detailed these changes, provided an explanation for each, and summarized the changes in tabular form. I was amazed, however, when I went to pick up my copy of ASA's 2010 version of the FAR/AIM, which includes changes from 27 August 2009 to the AIM, that the changes dated 21 August 2009 to the regulations weren't mentioned. Curiously, in the 2009 FAR/AIM from ASA, right inside the front cover is a big bulletin to be aware of changes coming to regulations in 2009! The fact that this was printed in the 'old' FAR/AIM, but no new changes, other than the changes to medical certification and pilot age limitations (among a few others) are listed.
The only reasonable conclusion that I've made for this glaring omission is the fact that the rules didn't become effective before publication, although they were made public and were effective for 2010, which, by a strong sense of irony is the title of the ASA publication. Now, this isn't the only published form of these rules available, though many schools and instructors that I'm aware of use this particular book as the 'regs bible.' I don't know for certain if other publications have this problem, but I'd be hard-pressed to say that all the other books are accurate.
The most up-to-date site that I've found for regulations is the eCFR site http://ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ecfr&tpl=/ecfrbrowse/Title14/14tab_02.tpl. This site is current as of the day you request the information.
The AIM has a similar site http://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/ATpubs/AIM/ that keeps the AIM current, accessible, and fully electronic for easy research.
The end user, read pilots or flight instructors, have an obligation to find the information that governs their use of and participation in the aviation industry, but the ease with which we access information these days has made getting the information in a reliable format tricky. Books are the way to go when you're constantly researching or reading the material, but if you need a quick look at the way something is worded, I can't argue with being able to pull it up online and read it there. Personally, I keep both a hardcopy and softcopy of almost any aviation material that I can so I have one way of accessing the most current and another way of accessing what I need when I need it.
The Federal Aviation Administration issued massive changes to Pilot, Flight Instructor, and Pilot School Certification rules in late August that took effect 20 October 2009. These changes, coupled with poor dissemination due to ASA's publishing schedule have had a poor uptake by the general aviation community, the sector of industry that uses these rules most.
Now, I can't honestly say that it's wholly the FAA's fault that the instructors that depend and should be familiar with these changes haven't really done that. I've come to learn through my dealings with the government, that contrary to popular belief, they do actually publish these things in places that you can access them. However, I think the FAA could have done a better job in making the changes a bit more visible; the only way that I found out about them was from the FSDO when some documentation I'd been working on was slow to move through the Administration. I ended up stumbling upon these little gems by going to the FAA website, clicking on regulations, and then finding, right there on top, a little link that pointed me to the the Federal Register.
These changes, which include such things as duration of student pilot certificates, changes to logging PIC, changes the requirements for instrument ratings to be more in line with ICAO, and other various changes to certification time requirements, are far-reaching in scope, but don't seem to be realized by most instructors I've spoken with.
Within the Federal Register, I printed a 71 page document that detailed these changes, provided an explanation for each, and summarized the changes in tabular form. I was amazed, however, when I went to pick up my copy of ASA's 2010 version of the FAR/AIM, which includes changes from 27 August 2009 to the AIM, that the changes dated 21 August 2009 to the regulations weren't mentioned. Curiously, in the 2009 FAR/AIM from ASA, right inside the front cover is a big bulletin to be aware of changes coming to regulations in 2009! The fact that this was printed in the 'old' FAR/AIM, but no new changes, other than the changes to medical certification and pilot age limitations (among a few others) are listed.
The only reasonable conclusion that I've made for this glaring omission is the fact that the rules didn't become effective before publication, although they were made public and were effective for 2010, which, by a strong sense of irony is the title of the ASA publication. Now, this isn't the only published form of these rules available, though many schools and instructors that I'm aware of use this particular book as the 'regs bible.' I don't know for certain if other publications have this problem, but I'd be hard-pressed to say that all the other books are accurate.
The most up-to-date site that I've found for regulations is the eCFR site http://ecfr.gpoaccess.gov/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ecfr&tpl=/ecfrbrowse/Title14/14tab_02.tpl. This site is current as of the day you request the information.
The AIM has a similar site http://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/ATpubs/AIM/ that keeps the AIM current, accessible, and fully electronic for easy research.
The end user, read pilots or flight instructors, have an obligation to find the information that governs their use of and participation in the aviation industry, but the ease with which we access information these days has made getting the information in a reliable format tricky. Books are the way to go when you're constantly researching or reading the material, but if you need a quick look at the way something is worded, I can't argue with being able to pull it up online and read it there. Personally, I keep both a hardcopy and softcopy of almost any aviation material that I can so I have one way of accessing the most current and another way of accessing what I need when I need it.
- Robbie
- Site Admin
- Posts: 18
- Joined: 12 Jul 2009 23:11
- Location: Oklahoma
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