Airline Pilots and FAA Duty Regulations
The average airline passenger does not realize that an airline pilot can be scheduled to work 14 hours and scheduled to fly 8 hours during that time. The 14 hours duty day can be exceeded by 2 hours to 16 hours for operational delays like weather.
How safe would you feel riding around on an airplane with a crew that has been on duty for this long in bad weather? That is what I thought, you would not feel safe. Sure most of the time the crews are not too fatigued and keep it safe. My problem is that these long days have the good potential for the crew to be fatigued and make mistakes.
The Federal Aviation Administration says that a pilot shall not fly fatigued. The airlines tell the pilots in their manuals that they are not to fly fatigued. You know what, the airlines don't make it that easy. Many airlines will give the pilot a mark on their record that remains for 12 months. If a pilot gets a certain amount of these marks in their record during a certain amount of time they have to see the Chief Pilot.
This sure sounds like a system to deter the pilots from calling fatigue. I am sure there are many times pilots at airlines are flying fatigued because not many call in fatigued while flying. With the high number of long trips out there I find it odd that not many airline pilots are calling in fatigued.
More on pilot fatigue later.
How safe would you feel riding around on an airplane with a crew that has been on duty for this long in bad weather? That is what I thought, you would not feel safe. Sure most of the time the crews are not too fatigued and keep it safe. My problem is that these long days have the good potential for the crew to be fatigued and make mistakes.
The Federal Aviation Administration says that a pilot shall not fly fatigued. The airlines tell the pilots in their manuals that they are not to fly fatigued. You know what, the airlines don't make it that easy. Many airlines will give the pilot a mark on their record that remains for 12 months. If a pilot gets a certain amount of these marks in their record during a certain amount of time they have to see the Chief Pilot.
This sure sounds like a system to deter the pilots from calling fatigue. I am sure there are many times pilots at airlines are flying fatigued because not many call in fatigued while flying. With the high number of long trips out there I find it odd that not many airline pilots are calling in fatigued.
More on pilot fatigue later.
posted by Jet Airline Pilot at 4:04 PM
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