Great news for Mexican airlines and consumers…
FAA upgrades Mexico from Category 2 to Category 1
In May 2021, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) downgraded Mexico’s aviation safety rating from Category 1 to Category 2. This was done after FAA inspectors conducted a review of Mexico’s Federal Aviation Civil Agency (AFAC) and identified several areas of inadequacy. – Compliance with minimum safety standards.
To be clear, this does not mean that the FAA deemed Mexican airlines unsafe, but rather that Mexico did not adequately supervise its airlines in accordance with minimum international safety standards. I’m just doing it.
This had significant implications (more on this later), but there are now positive updates. FAA announced This means that Mexico has once again been upgraded to a Category 1 rating. This is the result of more than two years of close work between the aviation authorities of both countries.
For those wondering why the FAA has any authority in this regard, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) publishes standards that airlines must meet; This is because they are evaluated under the International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) program.
The FAA uses these international standards to improve civil aviation standards for all countries with airlines applying to serve the United States or participating in codeshare agreements with U.S. carriers. Evaluate authorities.
What is the impact of this?
With Mexico once again receiving a Category 1 rating from the FAA, Mexican airlines will:
- You can start new services to the US in the usual way
- Can participate in reciprocal codeshare agreements with US airlines
Meanwhile, Mexico had a Category 2 rating from the FAA for more than two years;
- Failed to start new service to US
- Existing services to the United States were limited to previous levels while corrective actions were taken
- Code sharing with US airlines was not possible.
As a result, for the past several years, Mexican airlines have been unable to add new routes or flights to the United States or codeshare with American carriers. That’s about to change. This means Aeromexico and Delta Air Lines can resume codesharing, and we can also expect the Mexican carrier to open new routes to the United States.
conclusion
More than two years after being downgraded, Mexico has regained Category 1 status by the FAA. This means that airlines originating from Mexico can once again add new routes to the United States, and code sharing between airlines originating from the United States and those originating from Mexico can resume.
We believe this is an important advance and one that many airlines appreciate (although U.S. carriers without significant partnerships in Mexico may face additional competition). Because of their gender, they are probably not happy about this).
What do you think about Mexico regaining FAA Category 1 status?