Originally Posted by
VanillaAK
Ok. Yeah I read through the whole thread but I asked the question because I didn't fully understand the on-call part. From my perspective, it seemed like in order to be able to show up in to the airport within 30 min, you would need to live close to base and be at home. Like I guess I didn't understand if its 2:00am on a Tuesday and I'm sleeping, I would need to make sure I heard the phone and got decent rest beforehand somehow and still made it to the airplane in time? That's the part that's still fuzzy to me. I guess I understand tracking the aircraft to see the possibility of being called helps and being in group chats but I just haven't worked in that type of environment before and it sounded interesting. Thanks for the info.
Rest? What's that? haha... When it's busy, it can be quite fatiguing, absolutely. You will get called at 2am and every other hour of the day possible and it is expected that you hear your phone and answer it (or at least return the call promptly should you be occupied like taking a shower or otherwise). You won't have "decent" rest when you get called unexpectedly while in a dead sleep. You also won't get decent rest when you get a trip at 10pm after being up all day. It's kind of on you to sort these things out and nap in the day if there is a chance at getting called.
It is interesting and good flying, but hard to keep up longer than 2 years. Most get burnt out after just one year. But summertime is typically slow so it's possible to have a little bit of a reset before the winter busy season.
Originally Posted by
JulesWinfield
Yeah, this is why 24/7 on call is illegal. You need 10 hours of rest before accepting a duty period.
Yep, we've been over this. The FAA and all the POIs who work with these operators know of the practice and do not stop it. I'm not saying that makes it right, but if you choose to work at Berry, or any other operator like this, you will have to accept it to remain employed. You get a 10 hour "rest opportunity" where you are free from all duty prior to being called. What one does with these 10 hours is up to them. That 10 hours can very well turn into 15 or 24 or hell even 4 days but you will not get a call within 10 hours of ending a trip.