Originally Posted by
UCLAbruins
i'm not going to argue with you, feel free to believe whatever you want
When you don't stop, you need 4 pilots (12+ hr flight). That means the front part of the cabin becomes a crew-rest area, so passengers loose half the cabin, and you loose that to gain 30 minutes by going slow non-stop vs going fast and stoping
My experience, 6+ years of flying Gulfstreams, passengers woud much rather go fast, and stop.... They also want to keep the cabin all to themselves. I just did one of those to tokyo
I've been going to FSI Savannah for the last 6 years, haven't met a single corporate pilot who's done a polar crossing, not one. But I'm sure they're outhere
Theres certainly a few out there that do NY-Asia/Russia.
We have done Fairbanks-Europe and it crosses just over Thule in Greenland. Not sure if thats a "polar" op but its no big deal really. Positioning a crew to Fairbanks is the PITA. PANC is much easier.
The city pairs have to work well, as its often the logistics of positioning a crew to some odd place thats the factor. Nobody wants to repo multiple legs, on Aeroflot etc.
Most Part 91 places I have seen also use 3 pilots up to 18hrs (then 24 off) I don't know any that carry 4. IMO it does not matter, all you wind up with when augmenting crews is 3-4 tired people anyhow. Its all a poor excuse for rest on a corporate jet and I'm all for full crew swaps at a tech stop....unfortunately it just doesn't work that way in the real world all the time.
I'm sure as legs get longer on the newest airplanes and with all the money in Asia and Russia this will become more of an issue....18hrs crammed into a business jet here we come..
