What? BOS-LHR is 2,829 nm great circle. Just under 3,000 nm for JFK-LHR. What transcon is longer than that? Longest transcon is around 2350nm (BOS-SFO and MIA-SEA are roughly that distance). I guess if you consider something like ATL-ANC (2,964nm) a transcon, you could say it’s similar, but you you said much longer (and I don’t think most consider that a transcon in the traditional sense, as it’s outside of the contiguous 48).

But I agree with your point that especially eastbound, 3 crew probably isn’t required. But there’s a good chance they would be needed for the return, and it probably isn’t worthwhile to deadhead someone (in mint) eastbound just to augment westbound, especially with so few flights and so little operational flexibility (in this regard with available crew block time), which could just be mitigated with augmentation. Either way, that mint seat will likely be used for either a deadheader or an augmented crewmember and won’t be producing revenue.

 

MIA-ANC comes to mind but of course I'm thinking time rather than distance. When you factor in strong winter winds TATL legs can run under 6 hours in a fast airplane. I recall doing two man flights in the slow direction as well. The point being that these aren't 14-16 hour flights. With a three man crew your rest will be more of a meal break than actual rest. A mint seat should do nicely in my opinion.

 

Fortunately, the FARs and our contract will dictate what constitutes an acceptable crew rest facility, and not your opinion.

 

Yes and indeed the FARs and our contract dictate that a mint seat meets those requirements, and yes certain TATL flights at certain times of year would not require augmentation to extend duty time (on a good day with no delays) but with little cushion. In fact if an augment falls sick downrange expect them to plan an attempt back to base unaugmented or at least get to Halifax or St. Johns. That’s really all he was saying and he is correct.

 

So the partial cancellation bid looks like it’ll be lots of fun


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