Airman Certification Standards and Practical Test Standards for Airmen; Incorporation by Reference

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION <SUBAGY>Federal Aviation Administration</SUBAGY> <CFR>14 CFR Parts 61, 63, and 65</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket No. FAA-2022-1463; Amdt. Nos. 61-153, 63-46, and 65-64]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 2120-AL74</RIN> <SUBJECT>Airman Certification Standards and Practical Test Standards for Airmen; Incorporation by Reference</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Department of Transportation (DOT). <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> This final rule revises certain regulations governing airman certification. Specifically, the FAA Airman Certification Standards and Practical Test Standards comprise the testing standard for practical tests and proficiency checks for persons seeking or holding an airman certificate and/or rating. This rule incorporates these Airman Certification Standards and Practical Test Standards by reference into the certification requirements for pilots, flight instructors, flight engineers, aircraft dispatchers, and parachute riggers. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This final rule is effective on May 31, 2024. The incorporation by reference of certain publications listed in this final rule is approved by the Director of the Federal Register as of May 31, 2024. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> For information on where to obtain copies of rulemaking documents and other information related to this final rule, see “How to Obtain Additional Information” in the <E T="02">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION</E> section of this document. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> James Ciccone, Training and Certification Group, AFS-810, Federal Aviation Administration, 800 Independence Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20591; telephone (202) 267-1100; email <E T="03">ACSPTSinquiries@faa.gov</E> . </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">List of Abbreviations and Acronyms Frequently Used in This Document</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Administrative Procedure Act (APA)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Aeronautical Information Manual (AIM)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Airman Certification Standards (ACS)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Airline Transport Pilot (ATP)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Area of Operation (AOO)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Aviation Rulemaking Advisory Committee ACS Working Group (ARAC ACS WG)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Instrument Proficiency Check (IPC)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Instrument Flight Rules (IFR)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Incorporation by Reference (IBR)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Pilot-in-Command Proficiency Check (PIC PC)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Practical Test Standards (PTS)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Vertical Takeoff and Landing (VTOL)</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">Visual Flight Rules (VFR)</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Table of Contents</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">I. Executive Summary</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">II. Authority for This Rulemaking</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">III. Background</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Regulatory History and Incorporation by Reference</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Summary of NPRM</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">C. General Overview of Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">IV. Discussion of the Final Rule and Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Amendments to 14 CFR Parts 61, 63, and 65</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">1. Comments Concerning IBR</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">2. Final Rule Amendments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Discussion of Comments Related to the ACS and PTS</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">1. Broad ACS Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">2. Specific ACS Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">3. Universally Applicable Comments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">C. ACS Testing Codes</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">D. Record of Changes</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">E. Out of Scope</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">V. Regulatory Notices and Analyses</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Regulatory Evaluation</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">1. Baseline for the Analysis</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">2. Benefits</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">3. Costs</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">4. Regulatory Alternatives</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Regulatory Flexibility Act</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">C. International Trade Impact Assessment</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">D. Unfunded Mandates Assessment</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">E. Paperwork Reduction Act</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">F. International Compatibility</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">G. Environmental Analysis</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">VI. Executive Order Determinations</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Executive Order 13132, Federalism</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Executive Order 13175, Consultation and Coordination With Indian Tribal Governments</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">C. Executive Order 13211, Regulations That Significantly Affect Energy Supply, Distribution, or Use</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">D. Executive Order 13609, Promoting International Regulatory Cooperation</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-2">VII. Additional Information</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">A. Electronic Access and Filing</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP1-2">B. Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Executive Summary</HD> This final rule adopts several amendments to parts 61, 63, and 65 of Title 14 of the Code of Federal Regulations (14 CFR) by incorporating by reference (IBR) the Airman Certification Standards (ACS) and Practical Test Standards (PTS). The ACS and PTS  <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> serve as the testing standards for airman certificates and rating practical tests. The FAA notes that, while certain revisions were made to the ACS and PTS as an outgrowth of public notice and comment, there are no major substantive changes to the testing standards already in use or the conduct of the practical test such that the scope of the practical test is altered. Rather, this final rule brings the ACS and PTS into the FAA regulations through the proper notice and comment process required by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). <SU>2</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  ACS and PTS refers to both the singular Standard and the plural Standards throughout the document. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>2</SU>  5 U.S.C. 551-559. </FTNT> As it pertains to pilots and flight instructors, the FAA incorporates thirty (30) pilot and flight instructor ACS and PTS in part 61 by reference through a centralized IBR section in new § 61.14. The FAA directs compliance on the respective practical tests and proficiency checks with the appropriate ACS and PTS through revisions in §§ 61.43, 61.57, 61.58, 61.321, and 61.419. Additionally, the final rule adds an appendix to part 61, which sets forth which ACS or PTS applies to a certificate and/or rating sought or proficiency check. This final rule also makes a non-substantive conforming amendment to § 61.157 to align the Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) airplane and powered-lift flight proficiency areas of operation with the areas of operation contained in the ATP and Type Rating for Airplane Category ACS and ATP and Type Rating for Powered-Lift Category ACS, respectively. The FAA also revised “must consist of” in § 61.57(d) to “must include” to align with the definitions in § 1.3. The remaining changes were made to the ACS or PTS documents as a result of public comments. Further, this final rule revises certain provisions applicable to flight engineers in part 63 and aircraft dispatchers and parachute riggers in part 65. First, this final rule incorporates the Flight Engineer PTS by reference in § 63.39. Additionally, this final rule adds the Aircraft Dispatcher PTS and Parachute Rigger PTS to § 65.23, the existing centralized IBR section for part 65, and removes the now inapplicable Aviation Mechanic PTS from the centralized section. The final rule also revises the appropriate sections in subparts C and F of part 65 ( <E T="03">i.e.,</E> §§ 65.59, 65.115, 65.119, 65.123) to require compliance with the respective PTS. Finally, minor editorial revisions remove gender references in both parts. <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Authority for This Rulemaking</HD> The FAA's authority to issue rules regarding aviation safety is found in title 49 of the United States Code (U.S.C.). Subtitle I, section 106, describes the authority of the FAA Administrator to promulgate regulations and rules. Subtitle VII, Aviation Programs, describes in more detail the scope of the agency's authority. This rulemaking is promulgated under the authority granted to the Administrator in 49 U.S.C. subtitle VII, part A, subpart iii, chapter 401, Section 40113 (prescribing general authority of the Administrator of the FAA with respect to aviation safety duties and powers to prescribe regulations) and subpart III, chapter 447, sections 44701 (general authority of the Administrator to promote safe flight of civil aircraft in air commerce by prescribing regulations and setting minimum standards for other practices, methods, and procedures necessary for safety in air commerce and national security), 44702 (general authority of the Administrator to issue airman certificates), and 44703 (general authority of the Administrator to prescribe regulations for the issuance of airman certificates when the Administrator finds, after investigation, that an individual is qualified for and physically able to perform the duties related to the position authorized by the certificate). This rulemaking is within the scope of that authority. <HD SOURCE="HD1">III. Background</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD2">A. Regulatory History and Incorporation by Reference</HD> Under 49 U.S.C. 44703, the Administrator of the FAA possesses the authority to issue airman certificates when the Administrator finds, after investigation, that an individual is qualified for and able to perform the duties related to the position authorized by the certificate. <SU>3</SU> <FTREF/> The Administrator carries out this investigative authority through 14 CFR parts 61, 63, and 65, wh ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 296k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━