More Fatigue for AM Standby Crews at Purple
 

I’m posting this to see if others are as concerned as I am about the new way AM Standbys are being assigned at the Purple Planet. Specifically, it seems AM-Standby crews have had their rest opportunities severely slashed, which results in a tremendous increase in fatigue. As most A-Reserve crewmembers know, it was common practice in the past to get an AM-Standby notification 10 or so hours in advance. Countless thousands of professional crewmembers who were assigned one of these Standbys would come in early to get a sleep-room by 9 or 10pm, some even earlier, to get four or so hours of sleep prior to the beginning of their Standby period. This opportunity for some pre-Standby rest is now gone, since all Standbys are now assigned after midnight.Several F/Os have told me of the extreme increase in fatigue this new assignment process has caused them. Recently, I got my first taste of it myself. I was called in for a Standby at 12:15am. I got to a sleep room at 1:45am. After a very short rest, the phone rang for a 3am show to fly to city #1. After getting to AOC, another phone call – Ooops, never mind the trip to city #1, we now want you go to city #2 with a 4am show. Pushed at 5am for an O&B. After landing at city #2, we were put on a GOC hold for a possible trip to city #3. Fortunately, the third leg did not materialize, but gosh were we fatigued when we eventually got back to the planet. For the company to take away our ability to get some pre-Standby rest in the sleep-room just seems like the wrong direction for us to go in right now. We’ve had three recent FCIFs telling us to show up “rested.” Those words seem really hollow in view of what’s been done to the AM-Standby crews. I’m not on the MD, but really feel for those MD folks who are stuck in this situation. I can’t imagine getting called for a Standby on the MD at 12:15, getting to AOC at 1:15am, then at 3am getting sent to NRT, CDG, VCP, etc.!! Yikes, what a fatigue-related waiting to happen! Hope I’m wrong of course – as we all know, we don’t need anymore s. Best wishes for everyone to keep things safe out there!

Great observation. Please copy and paste you post and forward to the SIG, your ACP and PD (company SIG rep).

I completely understand the way that STBYs are being assigned to save money, and I makes sense to me. However, why not do the same assignment process 4 or 5 hours earlier.

No matter what the circumstances IF YOU ARE TIRED AND FATIGUED DO NOT FLY THE TRIP!!!! When they can't man the flights they will change the policy or the proceedure. If you report and fly tired they will just "kick it up a notch" next month! If something should happen during the course of the flight the company will hide behind the FOM. Safety is the most important thing at stake here and I am amazed that after the NRT flight 80 "incident" the company is once again optimizing. It is important for the company to stay profitable but NOT at the expense of flight safety!!

I experienced this last month. 12am call for a 130am stby. Got into the room at 115am, asleep by 2am, alerted at 3am for a launch to CYYC - KDTW. I will not do it again......

Playing the Devils advocate...
 

I'm assuming these STBY periods are assigned to you while on reserve. What if, instead of a STBY you were assigned a 13 1/2 duty hour trip on a 1 hour call out? If you are on reserve and you know the possibility exists that you may be called for a trip, isn't it your responsibility to be rested and prepared? A lot of people seem to treat reserve peroids as their own time and a trip assignment as an interference. It may be hard to do, but if you have reserve starting at midnight, you need to be resting during the day...not mowing the lawn, hitting the gym, buying groceries, etc.

Baron- You are missing the point. If you go to bed at 9 and get the call to go at 12 for an O and B, this is much worse than that 13 1/2 hour trip, then you are still back early or are in a recliner asleep for a couple of hours at the out base. BUT this is not the NORM. The NORM now as Velcro posted is they set you up for failure. I go to bed at nine, get the call at 1201, go to AOC, go back to bed by 0130, and then get a call at 3-0430 to go fly. By assigning standbys much earlier in the day I would have 6 hours minimum for that 0300 call if I was at the sleep room at 9 at night. I concur with Velcro on this.

POR on scheduling with CC to the SIG seems to be in order.

Yes, Baron, he is supposed to be rested. We HAD a great way to ensure 2-4 more hours of rest for the same trip call out but it's been flushed down the toilet. What we HAD was a good way to prevent fatigue that is realistic, not just directed.

Intentionally calling a guy in the middle of "normal" rest for a likely 3 or 4 A.M. show will be difficult to defend to anyone outside the company in the event something bad happens.

I know it has been said already and want to say it again. We all need to draw a line in the sand when it comes to fatigue. I have made the call under personal anxiety about what will happen to me. I did have to explain myself to an ACP. I did feel a little intimidated. But at the end of the day, the ACP told me that with our schedules we will be fatigued and WE SHOULDNT FLY. He also told me the company cant do anything to us if we call in fatigued other than ask us for our recent history. It verified to me that I wont question myself again. If I am too tired, I will call in. If you look at the June bidpack, I get fatigued looking at the pairings. 10 hour layovers, late morning DH's for evening departures then hub turning. The company is sucking the life out of us. We cant help the bean counters unless we take a stand. I think we should talk to our legal reps at the union about the consequences about calling in fatigued. When I did mine recently, they wouldnt return my call after I left at least 3 messages. I talked to my ACP without representation and it was productive. ON the airport stby that started this thread, you are a better man than me. I would have pulled the plug at the out station. It makes me tired just listening to it. We dont need another incident. We all wont be flying. 4 more months and the privacy agreements on the Enders report will expire. Maybe we can get some information then.

VC has a great point. I used to go in early for the STBY's as well and get a good four or five hours of sleep before they called me. I always prefer a trip to a stby when the phone rings in the middle of the night. Had one last month where the phone rang at midnight for a STBY, got there at 2, tried to fall asleep, then launched at 4am to a three leg out and back returned about 10:30. I was very tired by the last leg. Under the old system I would have had a good six hours of sleep, and would have been much more alert. I have been there for the fatigue call, if you really believe that is a no harm no foul thing, I got a bridge for sale you might be interested in. There will be additional paperwork and a phone call or two, but that is better than bending metal.

You get the award for most unrealistic post of the day.........congrats!

Why? I sleep the 8 hours prior and the whole 12 hours when I am on reserve. Gots to be ready for anything.;) String two, three or eight days in a row and I am rarin to go.

What was this old system that assured us more rest?

The one where stbys were generally assigned as early as possible as opposed to as late as possible.

Fatigue Calls
 

Excellent talking points here, the basic premise is that we are ALLOWED to call in FATIGUED, should the opportunity present itself. We don't need to chastise each other here nor do we need to pass judgement on one another, but rather, we should ENCOURAGE and PROMOTE the use of this venue if we find ourselves in that corner ........................ Not to worry about all the questions that come later, but worry more if you happen to "bust ATC instructions" or worse. I have personally called FATGUED for myself and my crewmembers, when the opportunity called for it, and I might have had to answer to someone for it, but I did not fear for my job or other such nonsense. The scheduling is in the hands of those who only look at the numbers and worry about reports, not those of us who are moving the revenue and heavy metal around this place. It was once said by past Management that we "must be good, not lucky", regarding all the flights that happen here ...................... I wonder (?)

From the FOM:

2.5 Fatigue

It is the crewmember’s responsibility to be properly rested for each phase of the trip. However, if circumstances prevent this, no FedEx crewmember should feel pressured to fly when not properly rested. A crewmember who is fatigued should immediately notify Crew Scheduling if unable to complete a trip.



Should an accident, incident, or flight violation occur, fatigue should not be a contributing factor since the FOM clearly states that a pilot should not fly fatigued.

Define Fatigued. Is the guy coming out of the sleep rooms stumbling and blurry eyed fatigued? Lets be honest, If we did not fly fatigued we would not be fat pilots right now.

"Complete the trip" is a key phrase in that excerpt.

Unfortunately, the company seems to differentiate between becoming fatigued while on a pairing and showing up for a trip unrested.

You can call fatigued if the cleaning lady wakes you up in the middle of your sleep cycle on a layover and toasts you for the rest of the day or you delay 4 hours for wx/whatever and can't fly the second leg. Now you can't "complete the trip" because you are fatigued.

You can't call fatigued (in their opinion) if you haven't started the trip. It's your responsibility to show up rested. I guess then, you're just sick?

I guess once a STBY assignment starts, you're actually "on" a trip so you could call fatigued when they wake you up in the sleep room to give you a trip.

The FOM uses the word fatigue, but does not define it. From NIH, "Fatigue is different from drowsiness. In general, drowsiness is feeling the need to sleep, while fatigue is a lack of energy and motivation. Drowsiness and apathy (a feeling of indifference or not caring about what happens) can be symptoms of fatigue." So basically if you are tired fine, but if you are so tired you don't give a sh*t, watch out. The problem is when you don't give a sh*t what motivates you to call in. - I have only felt this way once. Why not give a pilot the greatest opportunity to sleep as much as possible before he flies. To the poster that does not understand the stanby delema - set your alarm about 4 hours prior to your next am show. Then drive to work and get a room for a few hours then go to work. Do that and then PM me.

So does it matter that ever since 4a2b was implemented, I have had a lack of energy and motivation? :p

Who are you calling fat?

Is this why there are so many widebody Capts in the AOC??

:eek::p:D

Why is that unrealistic? The 12 hours off we get between reserve periods is when we're supposed to rest, isn't it? If you're expecting a call around midnight, then why not plan on going to bed around 4pm, and when you get the call you've had 8 hours rest. If you don't get called, then find something to do around the house/crashpad, go grocery shopping, watch tv, etc during the night. I do stuff like that all the time. Even on my days off, it's typical for me to stay up all night until mid-morning or so, then sleep during the afternoon/evening. If I have to do something during the day, then I adjust as necessary, but I NEVER plan anything when I'm on reserve. Come on, I get a minimum of 13 days off a month, it's not like I can't plan my personal life around that, and I'm a commuter.

Hey...you stole that from a guy I just flew with!

Actually, it was: "Part time pay gets part time motivation."

Anyone who can just lay down and actually get a "good nights sleep" in the middle of the afternoon is a better person than I am. When I was on reserve, it was always tough getting the right amount of sleep. Come to think of it, when I was flying international, it was still tough getting proper sleep. However, that said, I always felt that my first priority was to get rested for the next leg. My "off" time was always arranged around getting proper rest, so that I could show up for the next leg, rested as best as I could be. It was a self-preservation thing. I always wondered how the guys who lived in domicile could get good sleep, before showing at 0200 for a flight. I knew they were out playing golf, or going to the movies, or taking the wife out to dinner, when they should have been sleeping. I suspect that if I lived in base, I'd have done the same thing. It's gotta be tough.

JJ

You're either pulling our legs or you live in some kind of vampire world! I think you are missing the bigger point: YES, it is our responsibility to come to work rested, sometimes that is tough to do no matter how hard you try. The company has taken away a tool that we used to make ourselves more rested (read:safer) and more ready to operate. There is no reason for that, all they need to do is assign the standbys earlier. Yes, it is still our responsibility to either be rested or pull the plug and not fly, however it would be nice if the company could help us out. Good for the goose, good for the gander....

No, not pulling legs or a vampire, although I do sunburn easily.:D I'm just nocturnal by nature, have been since I was a kid. Must get it from my dad, he worked graveyard shift for over 30 years. Weird, I know, even more so because I actually like night time hub turns, and when I do international, the time changes don't beat up on me quite as much as they do some people. What can I say, I guess it's proof we're all wired differently. I see the point about getting the standbys assigned earlier, but of all the issues out there with the company, this just seems like a fairly minor thing.

Let me guess. Single or a DINKS.

Saw the MD-11 am airport Stbys post in open time around 1900 local time last night. Hope that trend continues...

The time to fix the "minor" things is when the company starts making the changes. Something we should have done with accepted fares and a whole host of other minor issues that have cropped (spelled with an a) up since we signed the last contract. But if you are happy I guess we should just move on.;)

KDen,

Unfortunately, I don't agree with you, in that I see this as a minor issue that can have major, major consequences. As well, it appears that it should be an easy one to rectify. The union should be discussing this specific issue with the company, post-haste. If for no other reason than to get a better understanding of why these standby assignments are happening the way they are. If guys understood the issue, I'm sure they would be more willing to go along with the way scheduling is currently operating. Only of course, if what scheduling is doing makes SENSE. Regardless, sleep is a major problem and the company should be doing all it can to assist its pilots in getting as much as they can (sleep, that is;).

JJ

BEWARE if you call in fatigued. You will have to speak with the duty officer. During this recorded conversation he will try to do one thing. That is to get you to self incriminate. Then you will have to call (or be called by) you ACP. Email circumstances too. He too will try to hang you.

We all have a file on us. We are allowed to see it. BUT if you call in fatigued it goes on some thing called a pilot report card. Bet you didnt know this existed? This report card has your picture and ANY derogatory comment that ANYone (mgmt/ DO) wishes to put on it. Call in fatigued its a BLACK MARK on you report card. For their future disciplinary or what ever actions.

Next contract we need access to our report card as we do now to our file.

I was told (right here) last month there is nothing to worry about as long as you don't cheat on your expense report.;)

But be carefull your APC post could be added to your report card.

Having an accident or incident with a jet, because you're fatigued, will leave a very big BLACK (or perhaps BROWN) MARK on your skivvies. Now I ask you, which would you rather have?

JJ

Part of their sleight of hand. They want you to believe it is no big deal and that you don't have any impact on it. They do not not want to see PORs addressing this fatigue issue.

Classic management technique. Throw too many issues at you so you think you have to drop some in the hope of gaining ground on the "most important." Or you get "fatigued" working on them all. I try to address each and every issue because I believe that reaction is never rewarded. I want them to address all misdeeds.

The fact is we don't know what will happen if a bunch of PORs get written.

This report card sounds a lot like a "shop file", which was grieved by ALPA at another carrier and won. Everything relevant to your position with the company must be accessable by the union/employee.

Sorry you guys are facing all these issues concerning fatigue and safety at a time when the Company is making profits. Makes it clear where their priorities are.

And you know about this how?

"and you know about this how?"

its not about me or how i know

Argumentum ad hominum take the argument off the subject and on to the man. Name calling not a debate winner.

If you doubt its existence its to your possible peril. Call visit your ACPO

My simple point for SIMPLETONS like you (ad hom) Is that there should be no double secret probation aka Dean Wormer of Animal House

Ok, wow. I simply wanted to know how you knew about this "Report Card". I guess I should take every anonymous post at face value.

Also, you seemed to imply that I had resorted to name calling. If you are implying such, could you show me where that occurred in my post? If you aren't implying such, then you have my apology.

Additionally, if I took every anonymous post without asking for further source information then I think I would indeed be a SIMPLETON.

Sorry if my asking a question offended you, I just wanted to know how you knew about this report card since no one else seems to know.

Skeeb"o" could be "O" and you just may have gotten your name on a report card.

I'm working real hard to get mine back up to a "D" average :D

Good guess. Yeah, I'm single, so no pitter-patter of little feet to keep me awake when I'm at home. At least not yet.

Jetjok,

I'm not opposed to the union at least finding out why the company is doing the standby assignments the way they are. There might be a good, legitimate reason for it that hasn't been made public. However, if there is, are we as a group willing to accept that? Based on what I read on here, I get the impression that everyone is convinced that everything the company does is evil, and if it's inconvenient for us, (which is all this is for the reserve guys is an inconvenience,) then we should start a fight with the company over it. There's plenty of other stuff to fight the company on, and I'm a firm believer in choosing your battles whenever possible. If you're on A reserve, then plan on getting called. Go ahead and take a 4 or 5 hour nap, and time it so that if scheduling calls you right at midnight, you'll have had some sleep. If you're not a night person, don't even set the alarm. That way, if you're not called, you sleep peacefully through the night, although you might wind up waking up at 4 or 5am. Too early in the morning for my taste, but if you like being up during daylight, that might be the way to go.