CDO's are a godsend too when you have a new baby.

Ed and Carl, I agree that we shouldn't allow CDOs. I think it's a camel's nose that Unfortunately, history has shown that they are no less safe than some of the other crazy clock flip flopping that we already do at mainline. I can't think of a single accident that has occurred during a CDO. I'm sure there's been one, but there is nothing consistent.

Guys,

I would like to point out two things:

1. The CDO fight is over - we are not getting them.
2. With the 5:15 ADG one of the main drivers for CDOs no longer exists.

If the company is going to lay us over for 30 hours they will pay us 5:15 for it without us flying ridiculous hours and crazy duty periods.

All is well on the CDO front.

Scoop

This is your original post referencing Comair 5191. I see nowhere in which you typed or inferred that Comair 5191 was an example of sleep deficit. You most certainly did relate it directly with CDOs though.

4 day domestics with all early departures at least give pilots the opportunity to get proper rest. CDO's do not.

It would be really interesting to see a study on the near misses. I remember being on a CDO as a 727 captain with a DC-10 behind us on the approach to DTW. We landed on 22R and I was dead tired taxiing on the parallel toward our old NWA terminal. We hadn't switched to ground control. Heard the tower call that DC-10 that was behind us and say: "Are you sure you're lined up with the right runway?" I instantly snapped out of it and looked left to see a DC-10 performing a very low altitude go around...over Willow Run airport.

Carl

That's what 5191 was on, Carl... a 4-day with all normal sleep opportunities.

Was that DC-10 on a CDO?

Sigh...I'll try one last time. I know 5191 was not on a CDO. I never said they were. They had the sleep opportunity, but they didn't get the rest. CDO's set up a structure whereby you're guaranteed to not even have the opportunity and be operating during circadian lows. 5191 was caused in large part by fatigue. Fatigue that is guaranteed by CDO's. Why would we ever do that?

Carl

Carl, it might be more accurate to say flight 5191 was caused due to lack of attention to detail which is normally associated with fatigue and circadian lows. It should be noted the solo tower controller was also said to be fatigued and did not provide a stop gap to the chain of events that ultimately cost 49 people their lives.

"In April 2007, the NTSB made four further recommendations, three measures to avoid fatigue affecting the performance of air traffic controllers."

That's fair enough- like I said, I'm against CDO's as well. Hopefully Scoop is right that 5:15 will help mitigate their attempted introduction later on in negotiations.

The NTSB did not agree that the accident was caused by fatigue, though. There were a few signs from the FO that he was fatigued, but virtually none from the CA. Of course there was the controller, too... Comair also had the practice of lining up where they line up and hitting heading sync without a heading crosscheck on the runway. No bueno.

A day one redeye at leasts gives the pilot time to adjust his schedule to get sufficient rest. I used to do the redeyes all the time - I did adjust my body clock (no kids at home) to go to sleep @ 3 AM PST and we generally got to the hotel @ 7 AM EST so I was only a couple of hours late to bed. On day 3 (after 30 hour layover) we were back to LAX by 9 PM PST and I was home by midnight ready to get back in bed @ 3 AM PST. I much preferred the one year when I was senior because they were still manning LAX and had 4 day (all day flying) trips that paid 22-24 hours and I only worked 3 trips (12 days) a month. That meant being on a different sleep schedule because I had to be up by 5:30 AM to make my commute in on Day 1. CDOs do not offer any flexibility to the pilot.