Airline Pilot Central Forums - Any "Latest & Greatest" about Delta?

Trust me , lived it for the last few days. Very surreal to walk through a packed terminal and look out and see the ramp virtually deserted with aircraft at every gate. Some carriers had 5 hour holdouts. The 3 hour rule is what drove many of our cancelations to avoid the fines. We did have one flight wait almost 4 hours for a gate however it was international so allowed 4 hours.
FAR 117 did not help the situation. She rolled in with near perfect timing. It's rumored that one or two airlines simply ignored 117. As far as I could tell we flew 117 to the letter of the law and it helped kill us in JFK that night. Crews finally loaded and ready to push timed out as the tugs were hooked up.
It's not over yet with bad weather in several major hubs.

Bucking Bar

01-05-2014 07:27 AM

Yeah, you've probably seen my post about JetBlue leaving passengers stranded for a week and even then stating they'll be treated as revenue standbys. Seems they could get them to MCO or something.

That's the kind of thing which could result in the government deciding "there needs to be a law ..."

I hope not.

Purple Drank

01-05-2014 07:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sailingfun (Post 1552429)

The FO should not have to play the fatigue card. He should tell the CA that he does not want to extend and the CA should then call the company and decline a extension. The CA should not place that on the copilot or ask him to call in fatigued.

No, he should not.
But I overheard an FO tell his captain in LGA the other day, "hey man, I'm really tired. I'm not going to be able to extend."
The captain said, "OK, I'll tell the dispatcher you won't extend. But I'm going to extend."
For every captain that "gets it," there are several weenies who don't.

Purple Drank

01-05-2014 08:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sink r8 (Post 1552313)

I think it is, but I agree with Bar. How can you tell when you sign that you will agree to an extension? The company hopes that some of the people will be deterred from taking a positive step to stop the auto-extension, because they'll be averse to playing the fatigue card.

In reality, an auto-extension is not an extension at all, but a longer scheduled day that bypasses the intent of the rule.

The safe way would be to call the participants approaching a previously unforeseen extension, and get everyone's buy-in.

By the way, it's preposterous that we both have to sign the release to say we're good to go, but the language on good-to-continue is all about the PIC. If an F/O doesn't agree, he/she has to essentially disagree with the Captain, and again, play the fatigue card.

The whole process seems intellectually dishonest to me.

A work-around in the interim is to send an ACARS the dispatcher before every leg that says "we will not extend."

flyallnite

01-05-2014 08:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sailingfun (Post 1552748)

I'm sure the numbers will reflect the need for something more to be done in JFK w.r.t. managing snow events and the impact on 117. All the money we've spent there and we might as well be back at T3 dealing with the rats and broken escalators. Sounds like it was quite the IROP. Maybe it's a good thing this happened right off the bat.

Bucking Bar

01-05-2014 08:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Purple Drank (Post 1552768)

The situation is ripe for one guy to play the other's refusal for their personal benefit.

I'm sure everyone has instances where they realize over the marker ... this wasn't worth it.

Scoop

01-05-2014 10:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sailingfun (Post 1552748)

I am still living it.:cool: Currently at the Roosevelt watching the Chargers try not to blow it. In the last 48 Hours:

2 legs canceled, 1 into JFK, 1 out.
Diverted to BDL today as JFK temporarily closed today.
Rerouted to cover a NYC trip.
Reroute canceled because my duty day would be exceeded - OBTW the company did indeed count on the automatic 2 hour extension.
Rerouted again - this one looks like its going to stick.

I must admit - I had a 0545 P/U in MCO today which was 0245 body-clock and I really appreciated the new shorter duty day even if the 9:00 hours was automatically extended to 11:00.

Scoop :)

Sink r8

01-05-2014 10:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Purple Drank (Post 1552768)

I'm going to assume you're putting that out as a hypothetical, because I expect better from a DAL Captain, but that's precisely the kind of thing I am concerned about.

In my mind a crew has to agree to go along, meaning all members are OK with stepping up to an extension, as opposed to someone having to take the bullet on stopping an "auto-extension".

You and Bar do bring an interesting point, in that we now have a financial dis-incentive to be the first to throw in the towel. You can just sit there, and wait out the other guy. Like out-running your friend trying to outrun a bear, you don't have to be good enough to fly, you just have to be less fatigued than the other guy...

Then you both fall asleep.

dalad

01-05-2014 11:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Purple Drank (Post 1552768)

I did exactly that when I was an 88 FO around 1991ish. The Captain tried to urge me into continuing. That was when we had schedulers in base. We were in DFW, and the scheds were in the satellite. I walked in and told them I was done and never heard a word. No one should ever feel they should continue. I will never make another crew member continue just because I feel ok.

forgot to bid

01-05-2014 11:24 AM

I got this text from a friend a little while ago

Quote:

It's melting down quick here. I just dh to an overnight to dh back. My capt has done nothing but dh since Friday. One was even scheduled when he signed in to dh to avl to cover the overnight and dh back. He called scheduling and they told him he had to do it. They won't answer and if they do they won't look at what your calling about. We need bodies and airplanes bad...

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