That may be so but it has not made its way to the rank-and-file FSDO level. And it won't, because no FSDO inspector is going to stick his neck out by being the first one to violate a company for "on-call 24/7."

Our company's take on it is that if we do anything to compromise our 24/7 availability it puts us at a competitive disadvantage because there will always be plenty of other operators who are willing to take the trip. We would have to hire twice as many pilots to give everybody a "shift" with 10 hard hours off duty. Until all companies are held to the same standard, nothing is going to change. We put up with it because the only alternative is being unemployed. The threat of a violation is simply not realistic.