The
Federal Aviation Regulations, or
FARs, are rules prescribed by the
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) governing all
aviation activities in the
United States. The FARs are part of Title 14 of the
Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). A wide variety of activities are regulated, such as aircraft design and maintenance, typical airline flights, pilot training activities,
hot-air ballooning,
lighter-than-air aircraft, man-made structure heights, obstruction lighting and marking, and even
model rocket launches,
model aircraft operation, and kite flying. The rules are designed to promote
safe aviation, protecting pilots, flight attendants, passengers and the general public from unnecessary risk. Since 1958, these rules have typically been referred to as "FARs", short for Federal Aviation Regulations. However, another set of regulations (Title 48) is titled "Federal Acquisitions Regulations", and this has led to confusion with the use of the acronym "FAR". Therefore, the FAA began to refer to specific regulations by the term "14 CFR part XX".