Originally Posted by
higgi8f6
Ok, so just a little change of topic. I was told by a friend who does alot of scheduling stuff with ALPA that, under the current NPRM for Crew Rest Requirements that our trips are already 80% in compliance. Very little would be need to be adjusted for us to be 100% compliant. Where we are not compliant is under reserve rules. Reserves are the only pilots who would really be affected by this NPRM.
What I couldn't get out was if we would require more staffing under the new rules.
Beyond whether individual day-today pairings meet the requirements, you also have a few other factors. The 7- and 28-day duty limits would limit the company's ability to schedule people on long duty days throughout the month, even if each trip alone was ok. Also, more reserve staffing would be required, or more slack built in, to compensate for the significantly reduced allowability of exceeding the duty day limits. Whereas we can currently be on reduced rest every other day, the NPRM would never allow reduced rest. Whereas we can currently go right up to 15 hours day after day after day, the NPRM would only allow us to exceed the new maximum duty day (by more than 30 minutes) once every seven days. I'm sure any of us who have been here for a few seasons can remember weeks in winter when we've had big delays causing extended days for days in a row due to snowstorms, and the same in summer due to thunderstorms.
It would definitely be interesting to see not just what percentage of the pairings comply with the proposal, but how many of the lines comply, both as scheduled and as actually worked in hindsight. The change of "monthly" limits to "28-day" limits also presents some complications, particularly in terms of more potential interface conflicts if we continue to bid by calendar month.