Airworthiness Directives; Airbus Helicopters

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION <SUBAGY>Federal Aviation Administration</SUBAGY> <CFR>14 CFR Part 39</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket No. FAA-2025-0613; Project Identifier MCAI-2025-00180-R; Amendment 39-23008; AD 2025-07-06]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 2120-AA64</RIN> <SUBJECT>Airworthiness Directives; Airbus Helicopters</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), DOT. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule; request for comments. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The FAA is superseding Airworthiness Directive (AD) 2024-26-01, which applied to all Airbus Helicopters Model H160-B helicopters. AD 2024-26-01 required measuring the axial play of the rotating scissors spherical bearings, and depending on the results, accomplishing corrective action and reporting inspection results. Since the FAA issued AD 2024-26-01, Airbus Helicopters issued revised material to extend the applicability to all rotating scissors spherical bearing serial numbers, change the initial compliance time, establish repetitive inspections, and extend the reporting requirements. This AD was prompted by a determination that the initial compliance time and reporting requirement needed to be modified and repetitive inspections for certain axial play measurements added. This AD retains the actions required in AD 2024-26-01, revises the initial compliance time, extends the definition of an affected part to all serial numbered rotating scissors spherical bearings, extends the reporting requirements, and requires repetitive inspections. This AD also prohibits installing an affected rotating scissors spherical bearing unless certain requirements are met. These actions are specified in a European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) AD, which is incorporated by reference. The FAA is issuing this AD to address the unsafe condition on these products. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This AD is effective April 25, 2025. The Director of the Federal Register approved the incorporation by reference of a certain publication listed in this AD as of April 25, 2025. The FAA must receive comments on this AD by May 27, 2025. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> You may send comments, using the procedures found in 14 CFR 11.43 and 11.45, by any of the following methods: • <E T="03">Federal eRulemaking Portal:</E> Go to <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> . Follow the instructions for submitting comments. • <E T="03">Fax:</E> (202) 493-2251. • <E T="03">Mail:</E> U.S. Department of Transportation, Docket Operations, M-30, West Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE, Washington, DC 20590. • <E T="03">Hand Delivery:</E> Deliver to Mail address above between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays. <E T="03">AD Docket:</E> You may examine the AD docket at <E T="03">regulations.go</E> v under Docket No. FAA-2025-0613; or in person at Docket Operations between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays. The AD docket contains this final rule, the mandatory continuing airworthiness information (MCAI), any comments received, and other information. The street address for Docket Operations is listed above. <E T="03">Material Incorporated by Reference:</E> • For EASA material identified in this AD, contact EASA, Konrad-Adenauer-Ufer 3, 50668 Cologne, Germany; phone: +49 221 8999 000; email: <E T="03">ADs@easa.europa.eu;</E> website: <E T="03">easa.europa.eu.</E> You may find the EASA material on the EASA website at <E T="03">ad.easa.europa.eu.</E> • You may view this material at the FAA, Office of the Regional Counsel, Southwest Region, 10101 Hillwood Parkway, Room 6N-321, Fort Worth, TX 76177. For information on the availability of this material at the FAA, call (817) 222-5110. It is also available at <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> under Docket No. FAA-2025-0613. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Zain Jamal, Aviation Safety Engineer, FAA, 1600 Stewart Avenue, Suite 410, Westbury, NY 11590; phone: (847) 294-7264; email: <E T="03">zain.jamal@faa.gov</E> . </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Comments Invited</HD> The FAA invites you to send any written data, views, or arguments about this final rule. Send your comments to an address listed under the <E T="02">ADDRESSES</E> section. Include “Docket No. FAA-2025-0613; Project Identifier MCAI-2025-00180-R” at the beginning of your comments. The most helpful comments reference a specific portion of the final rule, explain the reason for any recommended change, and include supporting data. The FAA will consider all comments received by the closing date and may amend this final rule because of those comments. Except for Confidential Business Information (CBI) as described in the following paragraph, and other information as described in 14 CFR 11.35, the FAA will post all comments received, without change, to <E T="03">regulations.gov,</E> including any personal information you provide. The agency will also post a report summarizing each substantive verbal contact received about this final rule. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Confidential Business Information</HD> CBI is commercial or financial information that is both customarily and actually treated as private by its owner. Under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) (5 U.S.C. 552), CBI is exempt from public disclosure. If your comments responsive to this AD contain commercial or financial information that is customarily treated as private, that you actually treat as private, and that is relevant or responsive to this AD, it is important that you clearly designate the submitted comments as CBI. Please mark each page of your submission containing CBI as “PROPIN.” The FAA will treat such marked submissions as confidential under the FOIA, and they will not be placed in the public docket of this AD. Submissions containing CBI should be sent to Zain Jamal, Aviation Safety Engineer, FAA, 1600 Stewart Avenue, Suite 410, Westbury, NY 11590. Any commentary that the FAA receives which is not specifically designated as CBI will be placed in the public docket for this rulemaking. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Background</HD> The FAA issued AD 2024-26-01, Amendment 39-22915 (90 FR 20, January 2, 2025) (AD 2024-26-01), for all Airbus Helicopters Model H160-B helicopters. AD 2024-26-01 was prompted by MCAI originated by EASA, which is the Technical Agent for the Member States of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency. EASA issued Emergency AD 2024-0206-E, dated October 22, 2024 (EASA AD 2024-0206-E) to correct an unsafe condition identified as excessive axial play of the rotating scissors spherical bearings. AD 2024-26-01 required a one-time measurement of the axial play of the rotating scissors spherical bearings, and depending on the results, accomplishing corrective action and reporting inspection results. The FAA issued AD 2024-26-01 to address excessive axial play of the rotating scissors spherical bearings, which could result in reduced control of the helicopter. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Actions Since AD 2024-26-01 Was Issued</HD> Since the FAA issued AD 2024-26-01, EASA superseded Emergency AD 2024-0206-E, and issued EASA AD 2025-0018, dated January 14, 2025 (EASA AD 2025-0018). EASA AD 2025-0018 states that Airbus Helicopters issued revised material to extend the list of the affected parts to all serial numbers, reduce the initial inspection compliance time, and establish repetitive inspections for certain axial play measurements. The FAA did not issue an AD corresponding to EASA AD 2025-0018. EASA then superseded AD 2025-0018 and issued EASA AD 2025-0040, dated February 14, 2025 (EASA AD 2025-0040) (also referred to as the MCAI), to correct an unsafe condition on Airbus Helicopters Model H160-B helicopters. The MCAI states that Airbus Helicopters revised its material again to amend the initial inspection compliance time and added reporting requirements when the axial play exceeds 0.20 mm. You may examine the MCAI in the AD docket at <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> under Docket No. FAA-2025-0613. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Material Incorporated by Reference Under 1 CFR Part 51</HD> The FAA reviewed EASA AD 2025-0040, which specifies procedures for measuring the axial play of the rotating scissors spherical bearings and replacing the rotating scissors spherical bearings. EASA AD 2025-0040 also specifies reporting inspection results to Airbus Helicopters and prohibits installing an affected rotating scissors spherical bearing unless certain requirements are met. This material is reasonably available because the interested parties have access to it through their normal course of business or by the means identified in the <E T="02">ADDRESSES</E> section. <HD SOURCE="HD1">FAA's Determination</HD> These products have been approved by the aviation authority of another country and are approved for operation in the United States. Pursuant to the FAA's bilateral agreement with this State of Design Authority, it has notified the FAA of the unsafe condition described in the MCAI referenced above. The FAA is issuing this AD after determining that the unsafe condition described previously is likely to exist or develop on other products of the same type design. <HD SOURCE="HD1">AD Requirements</HD> This AD retains certain requirements of AD 2024-26-01. This AD also requires accomplishing the actions specified in the material already described, except for any differences identified as exceptions in the regulatory text of this AD. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Explanation of Required Compliance Information</HD> In the FAA's ongoing efforts to improve the efficiency of the AD process, the FAA developed a process to use some civil aviation authority (CAA) ADs as the primary source of inf ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 23k characters. 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