Originally Posted by
80ktsClamp
The fact is, Carl, that they were on a trip just like we do all the time at mainline already. They were on a domestic 4-day that had all morning reports. Both the pilots had a tremendous "rest" opportunity prior to the fateful leg, and the trip had a consistent rhythm to it (didn't flip flop days and nights like we do so often at mainline). Inserting that into the CDO argument is not helping your case.
4 day domestics with all early departures at least give pilots the opportunity to get proper rest. CDO's do not.
It would be really interesting to see a study on the near misses. I remember being on a CDO as a 727 captain with a DC-10 behind us on the approach to DTW. We landed on 22R and I was dead tired taxiing on the parallel toward our old NWA terminal. We hadn't switched to ground control. Heard the tower call that DC-10 that was behind us and say: "Are you sure you're lined up with the right runway?" I instantly snapped out of it and looked left to see a DC-10 performing a very low altitude go around...over Willow Run airport.
Carl