Carl's point still stands. They say in aviation, nothing changes until people die. The CDO argument centers around fatigue, the affects of fatigue on decision making and the catastrophic results that sometimes occur when that line is routinely crossed. I've flown numerous CDO's, talked with many pilots who have also done them. They are fatiguing and the shock to the abnormal circadian rhythm doing multiple days of them causes degradation of alertness, lowering of attention to detail and inability to function at a high level.

Some might argue they can do CDO's until the cows come home and never feel an ill effect and sleep at home no problem. We don't know what pilots in the pilot group can truly do that if any. More importantly, due to the nature of a seniority based system these things can and will get forced on folks who do not like them and are unsafe/fatigued doing them. Just call in fatigued you say? The company then increases the carpet dance routine. Guys who have no fall back plan with a family to support try to solider along and avoid making any waves and so on.

If this union and pilot group were to truly adhere to the tenants the founding fathers of ALPA risked everything for, there would be zero discussion/promotion of CDO's. We would however be talking about, among other things, how to further mitigate fatigue in the flying we are already doing (ie build trips that are all AM or all PM without jackknifing human body clocks to the bare numb end of wakeful alertness and low cognitive function). Not to mention the overall health degradation that occurs from such...leading to other physical breakdowns. The pendulum should be swinging the other way in today's environment. Instead of being on the defense for the next thing we need to give up to make the company another billion we should be discussing restoration and improvements to what was taken during bankruptcy and beyond.