Part 91 Crew Duty Limitations
 

I was curious what the crew duty limitations are for 3 man crews operating long range aircraft such as the Global and G550. Can you accomplish missions to Tokyo, Hong Kong or Sydney from New York with a 3 member crew and 1 fuel stop or would additional crewmembers be needed?

There are no duty limitations in part 91 that I know of...

Correct.....none.

So does that mean that a two pilot crew can operate a Global Express for the entire 18 hour flight, with a fuel stop, from New York to Sydney?

if you are stupid enough to accept it, technically yes.....

Are their any pilots reading that operate long range aircraft within their respective flight departments? And if so do you have company minimums or standard operating procedures for such missions?

Yes but remember someone has to insure the airplane and I doubt an underwriter is going to sell a policy that does not address long range flights for a company operating a Global Express in its flight ops manual. And the flight ops manual will have to then have some crew duty limits. Violating your FOM is a great way to invalidate your insurance.

So, yes, it can be done at least on paper. But won't there be a refueling stop somewhere? Can the GE do 18+ hours? If not, that means customs, refueling, etc.. and an 18hr flt turns into 20hr+ trip. Not smart.

This is true for your basic part 91 corporate or personal flight operation...however it gets pretty regulated when you start talking about fractionals. If you go into part 91K and look at parts 91.1059 and 91.1061, it starts out looking very similar to a 135 on demand operation in terms of crew rest and duty limitations.

Don't take my word for interpretations though...I haven't flown anything bigger than a Cherokee 140 since November and I've never been fractional.

Just over 10hr flight (14 duty) back from Vilnius turned into 19 of duty when we lost 1 alt in KEF. Just part of the deal.

Z

I have never seen an insurance policy that went anywhere near addressing duty times for flight crew. We used to do West Coast to the Middle East in one duty day. That turns out to be about a 24 hour day from start to finish.