Freedoms of The Air - First Freedom

First Freedom

The first freedom is the right to fly over a foreign country without landing. It is also known as the technical freedom. It grants the privilege to fly over the territory of a treaty country without landing. Member states of the International Air Services Transit Agreement grant this freedom (as well as the second freedom) to other member states, subject to the transiting aircraft using designated air routes.

As of the summer of 2007, 129 countries were parties to this treaty, including such large ones as the United States of America, India, and Australia. However, Brazil, Russia, Indonesia, and China never joined, and Canada left the treaty in 1988. These large and strategically located non-IASTA-member states prefer to maintain tighter control over foreign airlines' overflight of their airspace, and negotiate transit agreements with other countries on a case-by-case basis.

Since the end of the Cold War, first freedom rights are almost completely universal, although most countries require prior notification before an overflight, and charge substantial fees for the privilege.

IASTA allows each member country to charge foreign airlines "reasonable" fees for using its airports (which is applicable, presumably, only to the second freedom) and "facilities"; according to IATA, such fees should not be higher than those charged to domestic airlines engaged in similar international services. Such fees indeed are commonly charged merely for the privilege of the overflight of a country's national territory, when no airport usage is involved. For example, the Federal Aviation Administration of the U.S., an IASTA signatory, as of 2009 charges the so-called enroute fees, of US$33.72 per 100 nautical miles (190 km), of great circle distance from point of entry of an aircraft into the U.S.-controlled airspace to the point of its exit from this airspace. In addition, a lower fee (a so-called oceanic fee) of $15.94 per 100 nautical miles (190 km) is charged for flying over the international waters where air traffic is controlled by the U.S., which includes sections of Pacific, Atlantic, and Arctic Oceans. Countries that are not signatories of the IASTA charge overflight fees as well; among them, Russia, is known for charging high fees, especially on the transarctic routes between North America and Asia, which cross Siberia.