"Supporting the Nationwide Community of  Charitable Aviators
Flying to Help Others"

Headline News:

NAA /ACA 2007 Public Benefit Flying Awards were presented September 17, 2007 in the U.S. Capitol Building!  See details of the awards program on our site on our Awards Program Page.  The recipients are described on our 2007 Awards Page.

FAA AIR TOUR RULES ANNOUNCED: Volunteer Pilot Public Benefit Flying Missions Untouched by New Regulations.  - February, 2007.

FAA makes changes in proposed rules as requested by the Air Care Alliance.

On February 13, 2007, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) published its final “National Air Tour Standards” regulations.   In response to comments and testimony given in Washington by the Chairman and the Regulations Committee Chairman of the Air Care Alliance, the FAA withdrew a proposed amendment to FAR §61.113 that would have created confusion and potential regulatory and insurance problems for volunteer pilots.

FAA’s explanation of the final rule, while in other sections still somewhat confused on various other types of charitable operations such as local fundraising sightseeing flights, emphatically restated its policy on volunteer patient transport flights and other community service missions:

"Additionally, nothing in the old rules and nothing in this new rule prohibits a private pilot from taking a sick or injured person from point to point as long as it is not for compensation or hire. By longstanding enforcement policy, the FAA has allowed aircraft operators who take a charitable tax deduction to transport a sick or injured person without that operator having an air carrier certificate. No other form of compensation may be received. "

We are very pleased with FAA’s continued support of charitable public benefit flying.

Note: the Air Care Alliance worked with FAA in 1993 to establish the current policy regarding uncompensated public benefit flights. You may read the details about this on the following page in our Regulations Section: FAA Policy and the Tax Deduction Issue

Air Care 2008 Held in Albuquerque!

For full information please see our Air Care 2008 page.

Hurricane and disaster relief aid:

Pilots and others have asked how they could help following the hurricane devastation.

We are collecting information about participation in relief efforts and best procedures to follow.  We will update this as we learn more.

However, please first read the information on our Relief Info Page which contains special guidelines for helping during emergencies.  Last update on OCTOBER 1, 2005

AOPA has collected much useful information for pilots flying relief missions or needing to fly into the affected areas. We expect AOPA to publish updated information regularly, so keep an eye on www.aopa.org  

AVweb has also presented good coverage and useful information on their NewsWire pages found at www.AVweb.com

Other recommended general sites with relief information are: 
    http://www.reliefweb.int    and   http://www.oneworld.net

Much of the need will be for funds to pay for relief and rebuilding efforts. Before donating to a charitable group we recommend that you evaluate its reputation and fundraising practices.  Most nonprofit groups have listings on Guidestar http://www.guidestar.org or other charity evaluation sites. ALSO: If you have identified a general aviation oriented relief organization worthy of support please let us know about it.

Again: be sure to read our Relief Info Page which contains special guidelines for helping during emergencies.  

2006 NAA- ACA Public Benefit Flying Awards Announced - Presented September 11, 2006 in the U.S. Capitol Building

See our 2006 Awards Program Page  

Air Care 20067 Held in Albuquerque!

For full information please see our Air Care 2007 page.

Prior Photos - National Public Benefit Flying Awards

Awards were given to groups or individuals honoring them for their achievements and contributions supporting volunteer flying. See the awards page.

Air Care Alliance representatives speak out at FAA Hearing on National Air Tour NPRM - Washington, D.C. May 11, 2004:

ACA Legislative & Regulations Committee Chairman Jeff Kahn and ACA Chairman Rol Murrow joined representative of most national General Aviation groups to protest a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking issued by the FAA.  ACA was concerned that new language directed at "public service" groups could be misinterpreted to jeopardize volunteer pilot operations. In addition to proposing alternate language regarding public benefit flying, ACA asked that the NPRM be withdrawn and that a proper user input process be employed to find more effective solutions for safety needs of sightseeing operations.

Air Care 2004 held April 30 and May 1, 2004 - Palm Springs, California!  

Our annual conference was quite enjoyable and productive. Volunteer leaders, administrators, and flight coordinators from many other groups gathered to share ideas, plan inter-group operations, and improve their missions of service!  

See our Air Care 2004 announcement for some details. If you wish to hear about our next events, send an email asking to be put on our email newsletter and announcement  list. 

For prior years' schedules see the links at the left. Some have many photos.

Also - read our Last Flight Following Newsletter.  

Our January 2003 issue features stories about how the Flight Explorer service may have saved a life, how several volunteer pilot groups joined forces to transport a very sick baby, and more!

Volunteer Pilots Responded to September 11 Crisis:  

A number of magazines have printed stories about the more than two hundred relief flights and other missions flown in the hours and days following the terrorist attacks. For example, please see AOPA Pilot's article "CAP, Volunteer Pilots Give Mercy" in the AOPA Members Only Pilot Briefing section at: http://www.aopa.org/members/files/pilot/2001/news0112.html

More Articles and Events:

General:

Air Care Conferences: At conferences like the Air Care 97 event shown above, representatives from groups from all over the U.S. gather to share ideas, discuss matters of common concern, and meet in goodwill and fellowship to further their common work.

For Webmasters and Media Representatives:

We appreciate any recognition you can give the work of the many volunteers and their organizations flying to help others!  For further information and leads for stories contact our webmaster@aircareall.org.

ACA Graphic Logos Available: for groups wishing to provide a link to the ACA site, two logo files are available.  The large logo above in the page header ( www.aircareall.org/images/aca-print.gif 33.4 KB ) can be used, or the following smaller one, which is ( www.aircareall.org/images/aca-website.gif 18.8 KB ):

Following the logo we provide brief descriptions which may be used.

VOLUNTEER PILOTS - FLYING TO HELP OTHERS

The Air Care Alliance provides the only one-stop central listing for free air transportation services provided by volunteer pilots and charitable aviation groups.  

The Air Care Alliance is a nationwide league of humanitarian flying organizations whose volunteer pilots are dedicated to community service. The ACA website lists all known groups whose volunteers perform public benefit flying for health care, patient transport, disaster relief, environmental support, and other missions of public service. 

Newsletter and Announcement List: 

Join our announcement and newsletter list by sending a request to newsletter@aircareall.org - for additional information on joining or removing yourself from our list see the following policy statement and instructions.

INSTRUCTIONS TO JOIN OR TO BE REMOVED FROM THE ACA DISTRIBUTION LIST: 

Addresses on the Air Care Alliance announcement list were collected from many sources, including from visitors to our website who expressed interest, our prior printed newsletter mailing lists, and lists of prior conference attendees. Follow these instructions to join our list or to have your address removed.

To join the ACA mailing list send us a message with your contact information and the name of your flying group. Send it to newsletter@aircareall.org 

If you are currently on our list and wish to be removed please send us a message from the same email address where we sent you our announcement. Indicate that you wish to be removed from the ACA list. 

IMPORTANT: We will NOT remove names based on messages from different and nonverifiable E-mail addresses. This is to prevent other persons from removing your name from our list without your own authorization. Address your message to newsletter@aircareall.org

And thank you for your interest in flying to help others!

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