Night flying and fatigue
04-03-2016, 08:12 AM
#31
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Nov 2013
Posts: 2,756
Originally Posted by Tanker-driver
At brown there are more than a few lines where you'll routinely find yourself flying 180 degrees off of what you just did. For instance a flight leaving out of Louisville in the afternoon for ONT, followed by a 2100 show for the next go which is a slog out to PHL with a couple hours on the ground, then back to SDF. Two sleep cycles in 24 hours is pretty difficult. Or, ask the guys who fly it about the OAK death march. These are schedules where it is virtually impossible to get decent rest. In fact, I'm surprised there aren't more fatigue calls on them, but that's another story. Sounds like at FDX, it may be a bit easier. I think this is the contract language FTFF is talking about.
Of course operational emergency, or even flying to operational limits changes the duty periods, but they can't actually put this on the schedule.
04-03-2016, 11:32 AM
#32
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Feb 2011
Position: Unemployed 121 Captain
Posts: 246
Most ass kicking flight I ever made was on the B747-300 Seattle to Shanghai, non stop of course. 1730 LCL Seattle DPT and ARVL at 1730 LCL Shanghai. 13 hours block time with the Sun in the middle of the windshield; it never goes up, and it never goes down, right in the middle of the windshield. By the time you block, in you are so stupid you can't remember your own phone number. 60 hours later, same thing in reverse, except in the dark this time. Probably takes about 100 gallons of Jack Daniels to kill the same amount of brain cells. Any questions??? Cheers! 
04-03-2016, 12:13 PM
#33
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Oct 2014
Position: Retired from APC.
Posts: 507
Originally Posted by Adlerdriver
First off, I was joking about cancelling with pay for wx and purple has plenty of pay protections and one-in/one-out trips.
My real point is that you keep referring to what the contract can do for us to help with fatigue, and I would like to understand what you mean.
Maybe your schedules differ greatly from ours. Unless you’re flying an AM out and back at purple, if things are on schedule, you’re usually at the hotel by early morning.
If you show up in the hotel lobby sometime around sunrise, immediately get a room, it’s quiet, with a nice bed, good curtains and you don’t need to be back at the jet for 13 to 15 hours – what more can written words on a contract do for you to ensure you get adequate rest during the day? That’s kind of up to you, isn’t it? Back at the hub, if you have access to a quiet sleep room, with clean linens, a bed, a phone for a wakeup call and shower facilities – again, what is the contract going to do to ensure you get a nap.
I’m really asking (and have several times). What “scheduling limits and practices” and “scheduling improvements” do you have in mind that would help mitigate fatigue? We’re all in the same biz and unfortunately our contract is what it is for a while. You say you have more than a few ideas on how to “ameliorate” the domestic night freight experience we’ve all done at one point or another in our time at brown or purple. Let’s hear them.
In my experience, the “general disregard for circadian rhythm” occurs on the international side of things at Fedex. Flying around Asia for 10 hours of duty all night and landing at NRT at 0800L and leaving 24 hours later to fly another 10 hours all day is the definition of circadian disregard. From a scheduling perspective, it’s highly efficient since the two guys who brought the flight in 24 hours ahead of you are ready to take your jet and start their work day. Ending those would be high on my list of contract changes – but that would mean more crews, higher costs in the name of safety. Maybe next time.
Domestically, at least you swap your body clock to nights (as best one can) and stay that way for the week.
Both situations are going to create fatigue and there’s only so much a contract can do to mitigate that. Putting limits on numbers of legs, duty period length, and ensuring proper rest facilities can all be put in writing (and it is). If you can’t sleep when you’re given the opportunity, I don’t see how you can point a finger at the contract and cry foul.
You had some pretty good advice in your first post. “Find what you can do easily and try to bid those schedules”. It sounds like domestic ain’t your bag, since you can’t sleep during the day. I prefer international as well, but, as I’m sure you know, that has its own set of challenges. When I did fly domestic, I was able to sleep in the day. It was rare that I didn’t get at least 7 hours and 8-9 was pretty normal. I didn’t bother trying to nap on the turn at the hub for fear of ruining my day sleep (plus I usually felt pretty good anyway) - lucky I guess.
My real point is that you keep referring to what the contract can do for us to help with fatigue, and I would like to understand what you mean.
Maybe your schedules differ greatly from ours. Unless you’re flying an AM out and back at purple, if things are on schedule, you’re usually at the hotel by early morning.
If you show up in the hotel lobby sometime around sunrise, immediately get a room, it’s quiet, with a nice bed, good curtains and you don’t need to be back at the jet for 13 to 15 hours – what more can written words on a contract do for you to ensure you get adequate rest during the day? That’s kind of up to you, isn’t it? Back at the hub, if you have access to a quiet sleep room, with clean linens, a bed, a phone for a wakeup call and shower facilities – again, what is the contract going to do to ensure you get a nap.
I’m really asking (and have several times). What “scheduling limits and practices” and “scheduling improvements” do you have in mind that would help mitigate fatigue? We’re all in the same biz and unfortunately our contract is what it is for a while. You say you have more than a few ideas on how to “ameliorate” the domestic night freight experience we’ve all done at one point or another in our time at brown or purple. Let’s hear them.
In my experience, the “general disregard for circadian rhythm” occurs on the international side of things at Fedex. Flying around Asia for 10 hours of duty all night and landing at NRT at 0800L and leaving 24 hours later to fly another 10 hours all day is the definition of circadian disregard. From a scheduling perspective, it’s highly efficient since the two guys who brought the flight in 24 hours ahead of you are ready to take your jet and start their work day. Ending those would be high on my list of contract changes – but that would mean more crews, higher costs in the name of safety. Maybe next time.
Domestically, at least you swap your body clock to nights (as best one can) and stay that way for the week.
Both situations are going to create fatigue and there’s only so much a contract can do to mitigate that. Putting limits on numbers of legs, duty period length, and ensuring proper rest facilities can all be put in writing (and it is). If you can’t sleep when you’re given the opportunity, I don’t see how you can point a finger at the contract and cry foul.
You had some pretty good advice in your first post. “Find what you can do easily and try to bid those schedules”. It sounds like domestic ain’t your bag, since you can’t sleep during the day. I prefer international as well, but, as I’m sure you know, that has its own set of challenges. When I did fly domestic, I was able to sleep in the day. It was rare that I didn’t get at least 7 hours and 8-9 was pretty normal. I didn’t bother trying to nap on the turn at the hub for fear of ruining my day sleep (plus I usually felt pretty good anyway) - lucky I guess.
04-03-2016, 05:31 PM
#34
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Aug 2007
Position: Always Fly With Favorite Captain
Posts: 376
Originally Posted by Adlerdriver
I'm not claiming ANY expertise in every facet of our schedules and I know there are bad ones. I even gave an example of one of my personal gripes being the 24 hour layover (or 180 degrees off as Tanker -driver put it so well). Those are bad juju no matter where on the planet you are encountering them.
I was simply asking for some specifics because I would like to know how we can make things better.
My only issue with some of Mr. FTFF's complaints were that they seemed to mostly be the result of his inability to sleep more than 5 hours during the day. I guess my mistake was assuming he was talking about a basic series of night hub turns over the course of a week rather than some of the "throw a dart at the calendar" schedules that get made up out of the leftovers. If you have a reasonably stable, homogenous night schedule that doesn't have crazy 180 flops to your duty times and you can't sleep on your layover - it's going to suck and nothing in the contract is going to change that. My apologies if I went off on a unrelated tangent.
I was simply asking for some specifics because I would like to know how we can make things better.
My only issue with some of Mr. FTFF's complaints were that they seemed to mostly be the result of his inability to sleep more than 5 hours during the day. I guess my mistake was assuming he was talking about a basic series of night hub turns over the course of a week rather than some of the "throw a dart at the calendar" schedules that get made up out of the leftovers. If you have a reasonably stable, homogenous night schedule that doesn't have crazy 180 flops to your duty times and you can't sleep on your layover - it's going to suck and nothing in the contract is going to change that. My apologies if I went off on a unrelated tangent.
For an example of a 2100 Domicile reference show time out based trip to hub, the FAR 117 duty limits would be 12 hours for 1-2 total flight segments, 11 hours for 3-4 total segments. Cutting out such pairings would help mitigate fatigue. (i.e. instead of release time of 1100-1130ish domicile time the next morning, release time would have to be no later than 0800 the following morning for a 3 or 4 leg trip sequence.)
Adler's suggestion of all short non-stop flights do help in that for those times that I only got 5 hours of sleep, a 16 hour layover (vs a 10-11 hour) would enable me to squeeze in a 1 or 2 hour evening catnap prior to departure.
04-03-2016, 07:39 PM
#35
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jul 2007
Position: 767 Captain
Posts: 3,988
Originally Posted by vroll1800
I can't speak for Purple or Brown, but at my former employer, having the FAR117 duty limits would help mitigate fatigue. For back side of clock Ops, having trips routinely built to 14-15 hours of duty (with multiple legs, of course like 4 per night) is not conducive to good QOL.
Originally Posted by vroll1800
For an example of a 2100 Domicile reference show time out based trip to hub, the FAR 117 duty limits would be 12 hours for 1-2 total flight segments, 11 hours for 3-4 total segments. Cutting out such pairings would help mitigate fatigue. (i.e. instead of release time of 1100-1130ish domicile time the next morning, release time would have to be no later than 0800 the following morning for a 3 or 4 leg trip sequence.)
Again, speaking in general terms, most well crafted contracts at top tier companies, passenger or cargo, are usually already more restrictive than FAR limitations. The pilots who would really benefit from FAR changes are the ones slugging it out at companies that use the FARs as their limits and push their pilots as close to those as they can.
Originally Posted by vroll1800
Adler's suggestion of all short non-stop flights do help in that for those times that I only got 5 hours of sleep, a 16 hour layover (vs a 10-11 hour) would enable me to squeeze in a 1 or 2 hour evening catnap prior to departure.
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