Article 4

Ramp inspection 1. Each Member State shall put in place the appropriate means to ensure that third-country aircraft suspected of non-compliance with international safety standards landing at any of its airports open to international air traffic shall be subject to ramp inspections. In implementing such procedures, particular attention shall be given by the competent authority to aircraft: where information has been received indicating poor maintenance condition or obvious damage or defects; which have been reported as performing abnormal manoeuvres since entering the airspace of a Member State such as to give rise to serious safety concerns; in respect of which a previous ramp inspection has revealed deficiencies which give rise to serious concern that the aircraft does not comply with international safety standards and where the Member State is concerned that the defects may not have been corrected; where there is evidence that the competent authorities of the country of registration may not be exercising proper safety oversight; or where information collected under Article 3 gives cause for concern about the operator or where a previous ramp inspection of an aircraft used by the same operator has revealed deficiencies. 2. Member States may establish rules in order to carry out ramp inspections in accordance with a spot-check procedure in the absence of any particular suspicion, provided that such rules comply with Community and international law. Such a procedure shall, however, be carried out in a non-discriminatory way. 3. Member States shall ensure that appropriate ramp inspections and other surveillance measures as decided within the framework of Article 8(3) will be implemented. 4. The ramp inspection shall be performed in accordance with the procedure described in Annex II and using a ramp inspection report form containing at least the items described in the form set out in Annex II. On completion of the ramp inspection, the commander of the aircraft or a representative of the aircraft operator shall be informed of the ramp inspection findings and, if significant defects have been found, the report shall be sent to the operator of the aircraft and to the competent authorities concerned. 5. When performing a ramp inspection under this Directive, the competent authority concerned shall make all possible efforts to avoid an unreasonable delay of the aircraft inspected.

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-10-31 · Text as adopted (Official Journal); later amendments are not incorporated in this text.