For more than a hundred years, the world of aviation has been built on trial and error. It is inherently human. Although today we have many safety and quality controls in every facet of the aviation industry, years ago it was something that did not seem to be so necessary.
With the aim of making air transport safer and safer, the airline blacklist is a further step towards increasing safety in European airspace.
As a general rule, the most substantial changes relating to operational security in aircraft and at airports have almost always been preceded by some serious incident or system failure that has opened our eyes and shocked us out of our position of equilibriumwhich we thought was safe.
The world is made up of a economically and socially unbalanced country systemThe airlines operating in each territory are a reflection of this. From a series of air incidents, the idea of creating a "European air traffic control system" was built up in the European context.Airline "Black List to be banned from operating in the old continent.
Initially, not all countries agreed to the creation of this list, which was attributable to their commercial interests or to treaties in force with the countries concerned. However, incidents continued to occur and there was evidence of potentially dangerous airlines that did not carry out the maintenance programmes set by the manufacturers or by the civil aviation authorities of the countries to which they belonged. Sometimes the problem lay in the lack of audits by the civil aviation authorities themselves.
All this led to the European Commission in 2006 to publish Regulation (EC) No 474/2006 of 22 March 2006, which established the air carriers banned from the airspace of EU member states.
This list is not fixed, but is updated two or three times a year, usually whenever an EU state requests it or when the European Commission deems it necessary.
The latest update is dated June 2021 and is the 37th edition, banning 103 airlines from 16 different countries. In fact, there are states that have all their airlines included in the Black List, the problem being the low level of compliance with ICAO standards by state supervisory authorities. Years ago this number was around 200 airlines, the main cause of this reduction being the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, whereby many airlines without means, or belonging to countries that could not support them financially, have disappeared.
The current version of the list has two annexes:
- Annex A: All operations of the air carriers listed therein are prohibited within the Community.
- Annex B: The air carriers included are subject to operating restrictions within the EU. The operating restrictions consist of a ban on the operation of the specific aircraft or aircraft types indicated in this Annex.
But How can an airline be removed from the Black List?
If an air carrier considers that it should be removed from the list because it meets the relevant safety standards, it can make a request to the Commission, either directly or through its civil aviation authority.
In order to lift the ban, sufficient evidence must be provided to demonstrate that both the airline and the state supervisory authority conform to international safety standards adequately and sufficiently.
The Air Safety Committee of the European Commission will assess the evidence presented and if the outcome is positive, the airline will be removed from the Black List.
In the event that all airlines of a State appear on the list it is usually due to the low level of compliance with ICAO standards by the State's own aviation safety oversight authorities. In such cases, the State will be required to address the identified non-compliances before those airlines can be removed from the list.
On the other hand, in order to include airlines on the list, it is necessary for the European Commission to receive information from the different EU countries or from third countries. Some of these channels for channelling information can be: through the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), through audits carried out by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), in the national case, through the Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) or other international bodies, whether EU or non-EU.
This list is not only useful for the EU states and their common goal of safer air transport within the European airspace, but from the point of view of the consumer, be it a tourist or a business traveller, it is also useful for the European Union as a whole. a very interesting source of information when planning a trip..
So, dear reader, if you are planning to enjoy a dream holiday in a remote country, for example in South East Asia or Africa, where you plan to fly internally in your itinerary, it would be advisable to take a look at the Black List to check if any of the airlines are included in the list. You can do this by accessing The UE Air Safety List.
And from there, enjoy the journey.
