Audit key to keeping commonality

摘要

A team of European regulators is due to arrive imminently in Mobile, Alabama, to audit Airbus's new A320 facility to allow it to preserve production commonality with its existing sites. The audit by the European Aviation Safety Agency is required to extend Airbus' existing authorisation for A320 production lines in Toulouse, France and Hamburg, Germany, to the US plant. Extending an existing EASA certificate to a new site means the Mobile facility can keep its production process identical to operations in Europe. Its alternative is to request a pro- duction authorisation from the US Federal Aviation Administration, but small differences in the regulations between the FAA and EASA would require minor but meaningful changes to the production operations. The FAA accepts all aircraft produced under EASA-approved production certificates.