Originally Posted by Hipplewm

That is correct, you can petition the FAA and get a one time certificate to fly the plane - I think they are called "Special Airworthiness Directive" and an inspector looks over records etc and allows the plane to fly

I **think** it is typically used in the private plane world if a plane was sitting and passed a maintenance check and they need to fly the plane to a place to get the maintenance done - as long as all other maintenance is up to date and the plane passes a pretty thorough visual inspection, then the FAA grants the exception.