Fact Sheets on the European Union
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Aviation safety

Common rules, which have gradually been extended to cover the entire aviation sector, guarantee a uniform high level of safety[1] throughout the internal market in air transport.

Legal basis

Article 100(2) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

Objectives

The completion of the test internal market in air transport towards the mid-1990s[2] required that common rules be adopted to ensure a uniform, high level of safety in the sector.

Results

At international level, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO[3]) is responsible for setting minimum aviation safety standards, but these are not binding and so compliance is mainly dependent on its member states’ goodwill.

The creation of a European internal market in aviation has meant that all passengers should benefit from the same high level of safety wherever they fly in the EU. National rules have thus given way to common binding rules at EU level. In the same way, national regulatory authorities, and their voluntary cooperation bodies, in particular, the former Joint Aviation Authorities[4], have been replaced by an EU-level mechanism linking national civil aviation authorities, the European Commission and the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA)[5]. Since 2003, the EASA has been responsible, in particular, for drafting regulatory provisions in this field (forming the basis of the Commission’s proposals for legislative acts). The Commission, the EASA and the competent national authorities monitor the application of these rules within their respective spheres of competence, but also on the basis of mutual support.

The common civil aviation safety rules are based on the standards and recommendations adopted by the ICAO, but are often more stringent. They have been gradually extended to cover the entire air transport sector.

Since 1994, the ICAO principles relating to the investigation of civil aviation accidents have been part of EU law (Directive 94/56/EC, which was later superseded by Regulation (EU) No 996/2010). Investigations must be fully independent and aim only to determine the causes of accidents, and to prevent future accidents, rather than seek to apportion blame or responsibility. The same preventive and ‘non-punitive’ logic underpins the rules governing occurrence reporting in civil aviation (Directive 2003/42/EC and Regulations (EC) No 1321/2007 and (EC) No1330/2007, all of which were superseded by Regulation (EU) No 376/2014). Since 2005, any problems identified in the air transport system must be declared to the competent national authorities, which must report them to the EASA, with the relevant reports then being stored and disseminated for the purpose of analysis.

Since 2003[6], common rules have also governed airworthiness, i.e. how aircraft are to be designed, constructed and maintained. In 2008, the rules were extended to air operations and aircrew training, i.e. governing how aircraft must be operated. In 2009, they were further extended to cover the safety of airport operations, air traffic management and the provision of air navigation services. All the rules apply equally to aircraft and aircraft parts as well as to organisations and personnel with responsibility for designing, constructing, maintaining and operating them, including non-EU countries’ aircraft and carriers operating in the EU. In 2015, the Commission proposed tightening up those rules to take account, for example, of the development of unmanned aircraft (drones) and of the interdependence between aviation safety and other areas such as security and environmental protection. The proposal extended the EASA’s competences in fields such as security (including cybersecurity) and the environment. It also suggested some changes to the EASA’s structure (e.g. creation of an Executive Board to assist the Management Board and the Executive Director). Importantly, two additional sources of revenue (grants and air navigation charges for tasks relating to air traffic management and air navigation services) were also proposed for the EASA. Following extensive discussions on this proposal between Parliament and the Council, Regulation (EU) 2018/1139 was adopted in July 2018, repealing the previous EASA Basic Regulation (Regulation (EC) No 216/2008).

The Safety Assessment of Foreign Aircraft (SAFA) programme, launched in 1996 by the European Civil Aviation Conference (ECAC[7]), laid the foundations for the harmonisation of inspections of foreign aircraft, both European and non-European, at the airports of the ICAO member states in order to verify compliance with the minimum safety requirements laid down by the ICAO[8]. The SAFA programme was made mandatory for EU Member States, as from 2006, by Directive 2004/36/EC (which was superseded by Regulation (EC) No 216/2008). Since 2014, aircraft from EASA countries have been inspected on the basis of the agency’s standards, which are sometimes more restrictive, and the Safety Assessment of Community Aircraft inspections governed by Regulation (EU) No 965/2012. The EASA keeps a centralised record of inspection reports. Any deficiencies found may lead to restrictions on operations and, where necessary, the operators concerned may be placed on a blacklist of air carriers banned on safety grounds from operating in the EU. The blacklist was introduced in 2005 (Regulation (EC) No 2111/2005). It is regularly updated (via legislation amending Regulation (EC) No 474/2006) and published so as to keep passengers, air ticket sellers and the competent authorities informed.

Furthermore, since November 2016, all non-EU operators wishing to operate flights to the EU must prove that they comply with ICAO safety standards. This proof takes the form of authorisation issued by the EASA (Regulation (EU) No 452/2014).

The content of the blacklist demonstrates the need to improve civil aviation safety in certain regions of the world. To do so, the EU has set up collaborative arrangements with the ICAO and it assists countries that have the greatest difficulties in establishing effective air safety systems. This led to the creation of the European Common Aviation Area Agreement (ECAA) in 2006, with the aim of integrating the EU’s neighbours in South-East Europe (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Kosovo), together with Norway and Iceland, into the EU’s internal aviation market. The ECAA has already enabled an increased level of connectivity. Switzerland is not part of the ECAA agreement but has its own aviation agreement with the EU, namely the EU-Switzerland Air Transport Agreement, which integrates Switzerland into the EU’s internal air transport market. The EU also has Euro-Mediterranean Aviation Agreements with Morocco, Jordan, and Israel, which provide a regulatory framework for various areas, including high security standards, securing passenger rights, and competition.

A further aim of international cooperation on air safety is to facilitate trade in products and services, which may be hampered by the differences in national technical standards. Accordingly, the EU has concluded mutual recognition agreements on safety levels with its main aviation partners (the United States, Canada and Brazil). The EASA, for its part, has concluded working arrangements, for specific projects, with industrial partners from countries not coming under such mutual recognition agreements. The products and services covered by those agreements and arrangements can therefore be freely traded by the countries concerned.

When cooperation between the EU (and its Member States) and a non-EU country aims at the mutual recognition of certificates, a bilateral aviation safety agreement (BASA) is signed. So far, the EU has concluded a BASA with the US, Canada, Brazil, China and Japan. In October 2021, the EU signed an aviation agreement with Ukraine to promote high standards in areas such as aviation safety, security and air traffic management.

On 22 September 2020, the Commission proposed an upgrade of the Single European Sky initiative (see fact sheet 3.4.8).

On 29 November 2022, the Commission adopted a drone strategy that lays out a vision and a plan for the future growth of the European drone market. It sets out technical requirements for unmanned aircraft or drones and builds upon the EU’s safety framework. The new plan lays out how Europe can pursue wide-reaching commercial drone operations while offering new opportunities for the drone sector.

Role of the European Parliament

Parliament’s proactive support for the establishment of an effective European system for civil aviation safety has always placed particular emphasis on the effectiveness of the EASA and air passengers’ right to information.

Parliament has therefore always been of the opinion that one function of the SAFA Directive is to publicly shame airlines that flout international safety standards. Parliament has also taken the view that the Commission should have the power to extend any measures imposed by one Member State subsequent to a SAFA inspection to cover the entire EU. In so doing, MEPs laid the foundations for the establishment of the ‘black list’. Parliament also made the publication of the black list compulsory, and ruled that passengers are entitled to reimbursement or re-routing in the event of a flight cancellation following an airline being placed on this list. Parliament furthermore required from the outset that the EASA should be independent in the performance of its technical tasks and be given a broader remit. This extension was finally agreed in 2008. Parliament vested the agency with effective powers of compulsion and deterrence by allowing it to impose financial penalties proportionate to violations. The Committee on Transport and Tourism regularly invites the representatives of the EASA to exchange views on air safety topics, such as the interdependencies between civil aviation safety and various socio-economic factors, the mutual recognition of certificates and cooperation with the Federal Aviation Administration, the integration of unmanned aerial vehicles into the EU airspace, and the effects of global pandemics and military conflicts on air safety in Europe.

In 2016, Parliament also welcomed the Commission proposal to review the EASA Basic Regulation (Regulation (EC) No 216/2008), aimed at achieving the highest levels of safety in aviation. It particularly highlighted the need for the necessary provisions to adapt the EASA to new developments in aviation, such as increased air traffic, the widespread use of drones, the emergence of conflict zones on Europe’s doorstep and increasing technological complexity in aviation. In 2017, it called on the Commission and the Council to equip the EASA with sufficient resources and staff to ensure high safety standards and to strengthen its role on the international scene.

Key recent European Parliament texts in this area include:

 

[1]Aviation safety covers the design, manufacture, maintenance and use of aircraft. It should not be confused with aviation security, the purpose of which is to prevent malicious acts against aircraft and their passengers and crew (see fact sheet 3.4.7).
[2]The ‘third package’ on liberalisation of the aviation sector – Regulations (EEC) Nos 2407/92, 2408/92 and 2409/92 (which have since been superseded by Regulation (EC) No 1008/2008) – gave EU air carriers free access to intra-Community routes (see fact sheet 3.4.6).
[3]The ICAO is a specialised agency of the United Nations which was established under the Convention on International Civil Aviation of December 1944 (also known as the ‘Chicago Convention’), to which 193 countries have now acceded. The ICAO adopts standards and ‘recommended practices’ which are mandatory for its member states, but there is no binding mechanism with which to verify compliance.
[4]The Joint Aviation Authorities (JAA) was an informal body established to facilitate cooperation between the various civil aviation regulatory authorities of most European (EU and non-EU) countries, and was responsible for developing safety standards and procedures (which each State party was then free to apply in its own way). The JAA, which had 43 member countries at its peak, began its work in 1970 (when Airbus was launched) and was disbanded in 2009: the adoption of binding and directly applicable common civil aviation safety rules meant that the JAA was no longer needed by EU Member States.
[5]It should be noted that the technical regulations in the area of air traffic management and air navigation services are also drawn up by Eurocontrol, or by other standardisation bodies such as EUROCAE (Eurocontrol also implements part of this regulation). The extension of the common rules on aviation safety and of the EASA’s competences in these areas is accompanied by a clarification of the division of tasks: the EASA will now be responsible for drawing up technical regulations and Eurocontrol will carry out operational tasks relating to the ‘Single European Sky’ (see fact sheet 3.4.8).
[6]‘Technical requirements’ were minimally harmonised in 1991, by means of Regulation (EC) No 3922/91, on the basis of the ‘arrangements’ adopted (with difficulty) by the Joint Aviation Authorities.
[7]The ECAC is an informal grouping of 44 European countries’ civil aviation authorities, which seeks to harmonise their policies and practices and promote their relations with other regions of the world. The ECAC has no regulatory powers, but is a useful forum for discussion.
[8]The requirements set out in Annexes 1 (Personnel Licensing), 6 (Operation of Aircraft) and 8 (Airworthiness of Aircraft) to the Chicago Convention.

Ariane Debyser / Olena Kuzhym