Safety above all
 

http://www.ipapilot.org/letters/ChiefPilotsLetter.pdf

Once again, $$afety is our primary concern :roll eyes:

Glad our union has the horsepower and cash reserves to prevent any such nonsense from our companies "leadership". :roll eyes:

....and I though RF had our backs.....once again, I've been fooled by someone in management.

One question and its a serious one I don't have the answer to. If Part 117 rules are more stringent than the cargo carveout, doesn't the individual AIRLINE have the option to operate to the letter of the more stringent rule?

As a minimum standard it's the regulatory requirement. If any company decides to adopt a more stringent rule and it is approved by the FAA then they are bound to it.

This one isn't black and white, guys....

We wanted 117 when we thought we could work with the FAA on some issues and preserve week on/week off type flying with proper rest mitigation (ie good sleep rooms, block time limits, etc). When IPA sued the FAA, discussions with other unions (like ALPA) were terminated. At this point a unilateral adoption of FAR 117 might have some detrimental unforeseen consequences. Any chance we had to shape and massage the rules was lost when the lawsuit was filed.

For every pilot that wants 117 here, there is probably one that does not. This is going to be a very complex process, and if we were to be included it probably needs to be done with some pretty serious study on the actual impact. That is what CD's emails on the subject indicated are going on.

Not here to carry RF's water, but in six months I've seen him personally intervene and help several pilots with issues. He is CP...he is going to push for company position on 117, and that position is we don't want it. That's his job. What I would say is there are probably as many guys bounding into his office saying "protect my schedule" as there are saying "117 is the right way to go..."

While I haven't reviewed the current version of the rules, in the past our CBA kept us pretty much above most of the mins anyway. You will see longer block on day flights allowed if we get 117. Again--its not 100% good for us in some areas.

FAA issued the 117 rule with the cargo cutout before the suit was filed.
At the time of the FAA ruling, the FAA was not entertaining discussion about how to include special rules for cargo. Was a clean exception. All discussions and the NPRM was complete
The entire time the suit was in process, all pilot unions, Independent unions, CAPA, and ALPA were working legislatively to change the carveout as well in Congress.
Im perplexed with your version of blaming the IPA. Your timeline is wrong.
Additionally, not fighting the carveout like done with TCAS, battery concerns and the like, sends a strong message to cargo companies that they should also be excluded from other safety measures in regulations (again, TCAS etc)
Not fighting at every step is short sighted. 117 was a signal the FAA can be manipulated by govt and corporate interests. 117 was a victory for everyone but cargo pilots. Reason managements fought so hard even after they won the suit. They feared the legisative as well. Again, which had been waged by the IPA the entire time with other unions. Some more than others, but a team effort nonetheless.
You must be relieved cargo pilots lost the battle of 117, even though 117 is not all cherry's, sure encourages other carve outs though. FAA seems willing to oblige.
SD

Not blaming anyone...saying the FAA quit cooperating and taking input and thus many of the things we thought were going to be in 117 (which came about after Colgan mishap) when faced with lawsuits after the carveout. I was one of the grass roots lobbyist pushing for one level of safety, and later was Chairman of the President's Committee for Cargo. We wanted to bring in "one level of safety". We also wanted to be involved in crafting the specifics, not just have them thrust upon us by the FAA.

You are trying to stick words into my mouth when all I am trying to do is explain some of the concerns that even our own members have expressed. FWIW...I walked the halls of both houses of Congress on and off for two years pushing for one level of safety, and even brought one of my daughters up to assist and see how the process works. I pushed hard in July 2013 to be ready to leverage the next mishap that was fatigue related into a strong PR campaign to readress 117 cargo shortfalls. Unfortunately a month later we had that mishap, the A300 crash in Birmingham. I'm not the enemy here--I am in agreement that the carveout needs to go away. However, before you simply try to "plug and play" the current legislation having a smart, measured approach to minimizing risk and enhancing safety by working with science based experts makes sense. What I am trying to say is the FAA quit listening, and what we "thought" we might get before the cutout and what we might get now could be drastically different. We need to get some smart consensus before we give ourselves a worse problem than we have under 121 rules with a solid CBA.

I do agree, however, that the ability to exclude and cut out cargo airlines is a horrible precedent. I'm long since out of the fight, but I am sure that there are pilots right now fighting to fix that issue.

Albie, I understand your point but go back and reread your first post. The way it is worded sounds like you are blaming IPA's lawsuit for the reason the FAA isn't going to listen anymore.

RH is the new Cargo chairman. Email him and ask him to put out a piece on the history and that status of the legislation and ALPA's efforts. It would probably be worth a read by the entire crewforce and other industry pilots. I'm going to refrain from further comment because I do not the know the current status of proposals since I am now out of the loop, and do not want to write anything that would create bias toward anyone's efforts to fix this.

Well said. The day that FDX or UPS pilots negotiate away the protections they have now in their CBA's, we will realize this even more clearly. A few companies might have contracts that make being in the carve out ok in the near term, but NOT the long term.

Additionally, the amount of capital and energy invested by cargo companies fighting against 117 should be a very clear sigal to all cargo pilots. These successful companies are looking at the next decade or two under the carve out vs 117, not just monthly scheduling. The goals that the carve out was created for are yet to be determined and fully understood. I am very glad to see our current MEC chair has made this a priority.