EU - USA Bilateral Agreement

On 1 May 2011 entered into force the Agreement between the USA and the EU on cooperation in the regulation of civil aviation safety.

Note on the territorial applicability of the EU-US BASA

Article 12 of the EU-US BASA defines that the Agreement applies to “[…] the United States civil aviation regulatory system as applied in the territory of the United States of America, and on the other hand, to the European Community civil aviation regulatory system as applied in the territories in which the Treaty establishing the European Community is applied […]”. Therefore the Agreement does not apply to Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Liechtenstein, which are EASA Member States and Members of the EASA Management Board, but are not Member States of the European Union. 

Validation Improvement Roadmap

EASA and the FAA have developed a Validation Improvement Roadmap (VIR), with the goal of implementing a risk based approach for the acceptance of certificating authority (CA) approvals and findings of compliance without any further technical review by the validating authority (VA) within the scope of the existing European Union (EU)/United States (U.S.) Bilateral Aviation Safety Agreement (BASA). The VIR (which will be reviewed and updated annually or as needed), identifies initiatives to incorporate new avenues for acceptance or validation between the FAA and EASA, which in turn, will be integrated into the Technical Implementation Procedures (TIP). The three avenues for approval include:

  • Acceptance of Certificates and Approvals - An approval by the CA constitutes a valid approval in the VA’s system without any technical involvement or approval by the VA
  • Streamlined Validation of Certificates and Approvals - An approval by the CA leads to an approval being issued by the VA without any technical involvement by the VA
  • Validation Work-Plan - Level of involvement by the VA is established based on risk based principles rather than a comprehensive review of compliance findings made by the CA. (A work-plan is used for each project requiring active management oversight to ensure common principles and procedures are applied to maximize reliance on the CA’s findings).

The current VIR can be found in downloads.

EASA lists of Safety Emphasis Items (SEI) and Significant Standards Differences (SSD)

Please consult our list of Safety Emphasis Items (SEI) and Significant Standards Differences (SSD)

Technical Implementation Procedures for Pilot Licensing and Simulators

The European Union and the United States of America signed on 19/11/2020  two new Annexes, expanding the BASA to include the conversion of private pilot licences and to reduce duplication in the oversight of flight simulators. The new Technical Implementation Procedures (TIP), TIP-S and TIP-L are published below. Further information on the implementation is available on the Aircrew and medical pages.