On September 22, 2026, South Korea's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) issued Notice 2026-486, a partial amendment to the Rules on Designation and Supervision of Specialized Inspection Agencies for Aircraft Type Certification (the 2018-319 gosi, originally promulgated May 18, 2018). The amendment is signed by the MOLIT Minister, registered the same day, and takes effect immediately under its supplementary rule (부칙: 발령한 날부터 시행). It adds a corrective-order (시정명령) cascade that lets MOLIT suspend delegated type-certification inspection work at a designated specialized inspection agency (전문검사기관) that fails to meet designation, inspection, or follow-up standards, a supervision power MOLIT has wired in ahead of an ICAO aviation-safety assessment.
The instrument sits under Article 135 of the Aviation Safety Act (항공안전법), which authorizes MOLIT to delegate type-certificate, supplemental type-certificate, production-certificate, technical-standard-order, and type-certificate-validation inspection to qualified specialized bodies, with the Enforcement Decree (Articles 26 to 27) setting the designation framework. Notice 2018-319 is the operational rule that governs how those bodies are designated, how they run inspections, and how MOLIT supervises them. Notice 2026-486 amends that operational rule, not the Act itself.
Who must act on Notice 2026-486, and by when?
The obligation is already live. Because the supplementary rule makes the notice effective from the date of issuance (September 22, 2026), the corrective-order regime applies to every designated specialized inspection agency from that day forward, with no transition period. The first actor in scope is the Korea Institute of Aviation Safety Technology (KIAST, 항공안전기술원), MOLIT's affiliated technical body and the principal designated 전문검사기관 for aircraft type-certification work, together with any other organization MOLIT has designated under the 2018-319 rule. They must align their designation files, internal inspection regulations, and follow-up procedures with the amended text now.
Downstream, the change reaches manufacturers whose Korean certification depends on that delegated inspection channel. Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) and other Korean airframe, engine, and propeller makers route type-certificate and design-approval inspections through KIAST, and so do foreign manufacturers seeking Korean validation of a TC, STC, production certificate, TSO, or TCV. If a designated agency is hit by a corrective order and its delegated inspection work is suspended, those certification tracks stall with it.
What does the corrective-order cascade let MOLIT do?
The amendment codifies a graduated supervisory lever the 2018-319 baseline lacked: a corrective order that can require a designated agency to fix a deficiency within a set period and, where the deficiency persists or is serious, suspend the delegated type-certification inspection work the agency is otherwise authorized to perform. This fills a gap at the supervision layer, where the original rule set designation and oversight but did not spell out a corrective-and-suspend step for delegated inspection tasks short of full withdrawal of designation. The structure mirrors what ICAO's Universal Safety Oversight Audit Programme (USOAP) expects a state's oversight system to demonstrate: not just the power to designate technical bodies, but the power to intervene operationally when a delegated body underperforms, before withdrawal becomes the only option.
Why is MOLIT doing this now?
The timing is driven by an upcoming ICAO aviation-safety assessment. USOAP checks whether a contracting state's oversight system can effectively supervise the technical work it delegates, and a documented corrective-order power over delegated type-certification inspection is exactly the kind of oversight artifact an audit reviews. By entering into force the same day it is signed, with no vacatio legis, MOLIT puts the power on the books before, not after, the assessment window, and ahead of further delegation decisions on the same roadmap, which is preparing K-UAM type-certification-validation rules for 2027 to 2028.
| Action | Responsible party | Deadline |
|---|---|---|
| Align designation files with amended 2018-319 rule | KIAST and any designated 전문검사기관 | Effective September 22, 2026 |
| Update internal inspection regulations and follow-up procedures | Designated 전문검사기관 | Effective September 22, 2026 |
| Track exposure if a delegated agency is suspended | KAI, Korean OEMs, foreign TC/STC/PC/TSO/TCV applicants | Ongoing |
| Confirm oversight readiness for ICAO USOAP | MOLIT / Korea Office of Civil Aviation (KOCA) | Before the assessment |
Continuous, per-jurisdiction real-time monitoring surfaces a ministry-level rule like this the moment it publishes, so a type-certification or airworthiness lead sees the same-day entry into force before the delegated inspection channel it relies on is affected.
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For practitioners, the concrete next steps are narrow: confirm whether your Korean TC, STC, PC, TSO, or TCV application is in a delegated-inspection channel through KIAST or another designated agency, check that agency's designation status against the amended 2018-319 rule, brief the certification and compliance team on the corrective-order exposure, and if a current inspection is time-critical, ask MOLIT's Aircraft Technology Division (항공기술과) for confirmation via the MOLIT administrative-rule (gosi) page where the notice is published.
