Originally Posted by Carl Spackler

Actually, none of the LCA's threatened to quit. They simply wrote what is essentially a "white paper" on their position and included quite a bit a data from numerous studies on fatigue and other issues. When the DAL folks read it and gave no reason as to why they didn't want to change the policy, the meeting did get heated (according to a number of the LCA's I've spoken with that were in the room), but stayed professional. Heated, but professional.

The short answer is that the DAL way of doing things has the guys taking breaks every two hours or so. Besides the obvious issue of flight deck crew members making multiple trips from the cockpit to the rest area, our guys had studies that showed this is not optimal for getting rested. The other area is the DAL policy of the same crew performing both the takeoff and the landing. Since most of the fDAL trips were over and backs, it worked out great. One crew made the takeoff and landing going over, and the other crew did it coming back. Much easier to stay current. Our trips on the 744 and A330 are 10, 11, 12 and 13 day trips where you have crew changes on every leg. This makes it much more difficult to stay current if you are unlucky enough to always be the junior crew while the senior crew makes the takeoff and the landing, then moves on. It's resulting in a huge increase in the need for crew members to get requaled in the sim. Our guys' concern was not only the increased cost of the unnecessary training, but the problem of crews' proficiency.

There are a few other issues (read security and safety related) that don't belong on a public forum, but that is the short version.

Carl