Anderson

I’m picturing this cujo person having that light bulb moment where he/she finally realizes they’re wrong. It seems pretty clear that the 8 hour sleep opportunity does not have to occur within the last 10 hours of the rest period.


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teddy3412

I thought that happened a day or two ago and I was wrong. We'll see if he gets it this time...

Flyhayes

I think he might stroke out if he ever comes to the realization that he's wrong...

Cujo665

You just said what I’ve been saying. Except the 8 must be within the 10. You can be off forever, the only ten hours that counts is right before the FDP and it must have provided an 8 hour uninterrupted sleep opportunity. Read from the FAA’s own interpretation


https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org...rpretation.pdf

The 8 hours has to be within the 10. You can be off duty forever, but must have a legal rest period of at least 10 hours immediately prior to the FDP. That 10 hours must contain an 8 hour sleep opportunity.

rickair7777

What you don't get is that the COMPANY must provide you with ten hours, and the COMPANY must arrange it so your circumstances do not preclude an 8 hour sleep opportunity.

Typically the eight hours is a problem due to delayed local commutes, or the hotel room wasn't ready when you arrived, or the AC doesn't work, or the hotel is too loud.

What you personally choose to do with your OPPORTUNITY is up to you, as long as you're not fatigued when you sign in for duty.

True Example.: During IROPS due to snow, we got stuck at an outstation late one night. Due to station schedule, we had to return to repo the plane to the hub early, after about nine hours (ie not legal rest). Upon arrival at the hub, they put us on ten hours rest and got us a hotel, so we could fly one short revenue flight back to our domicile that evening. I had a good seven hours sleep that night, which is plenty for me. When I got to the day hotel, which is across the street from a ski shop and a bus stop, it was still snowing. So I rented skis, took the bus up the hill and went skiing. I returned in time to clean up and go to work. We blocked in at about 2030. So I had a good nights sleep, woke up at about 0500, flew one leg, went skiing, and flew another leg. No fatigue there, at least not for me. If any questions were raised it was clear I got plenty of circadian-appropriate sleep.

Cujo665

I agree you aren’t required to actually sleep.

I agree that the 10 hours must afford an 8 hour sleep opportunity

I agree that under 117.5 you can sign in fit for duty based on your own opinion.

The issue is that if you commuted during the 10 hours, and spent over 2 hours doing so... then by definition you did not have the required 8 hour uninterrupted sleep opportunity prescribed by 117.25

If that commute was by aircraft, then it most definately was not 8 uninterrupted... unless you flew a long haul 8+ hours.

Nobody is going to chase anybody down over this... until another Colgan happens. It’s don’t ask, don’t tell.

I like your skiing example. It provided 10 prior to FDP and it provided 8 uninterrupted sleep opportunity in that 10 hours.
This is where the certification under 117.5 comes in. In your case you had a 8 hour sleep opportunity. You chose not to use it.
In the commuting over 2 hours case, they by definition didn’t have the 8 hour sleep opportunity. You can do whatever you want, so long as you actually had the 8 hours available.

Read that FAA interpretation. It cites a similar example with explanations over dual outcomes. Read example 3 on page 3

The burden rests on the crew member......
classic don’t ask, don’t tell

vessbot

The reg does not say this, and neither does the Office of the Chief Council's interpretation. What is your basis for claiming this?

I see where you may be coming from, but if I'm right, it's a mistake. There's another way of grammatically parsing the sentence, but it leads to an oxymoron so it doesn't make sense.

You can take out a longer section as the subordinate clause, and I'll just mark it here with brackets:

"No certificate holder may schedule and no flightcrew member may accept an assignment for any reserve or flight duty period unless the flightcrew member is given a rest period [of at least 10 consecutive hours immediately before beginning the reserve or flight duty period] measured from the time the flightcrew member is released from duty. "

If you break it down this way, then the "immediately before beginning the reserve or FDP" appears to describe the "10 consecutive hours." And this is probably what you're basing your interpretation on. However, if you write out the sentence without the clause, it reads:

"... unless the flightcrew member is given a rest period measured from the time the flightcrew member is released from duty.

... which is grammatical and makes sense, based on which you may say that this interpretation is as equally valid as mine. However, this way "a rest period" is "measured from the time the flightcrew member is released from duty," which is incompatible with being "of at least 10 consecutive hours immediately before beginning the reserve or flight duty period." Unless it's exactly 10 hours, that's a contradiction, since it cannot be both measured from release from the previous duty, and be immediately before the current duty in question. Therefore, this is not a valid interpretation.

"immediately before beginning the [reserve/FDP]" is a quality of the "rest period," not the "10 consecutive hours." If the rest period is 500 hours, you can be awake for the last 492 and satisfy the reg.

Nothing about the reg or its interpretation says that the 8 hour sleep opportunity has to be contained in the last 10 hours of the rest period.

Cujo665

No, the rest period is measured from when duty ends, because otherwise it would begin when the FDP ends which isn’t necessarily the same time. It says rest is measured from when duty ends because it could be a 30 hour required minimum rest, or even something in between as a DH across theaters requiring compensatory rest above 10 hours. You are in rest once your duty ends.
To start a new FDP you need 10/8 immediately prior to starting the new FDP... you could have 30, 65, 10,000 off... it’s the ten before starting the new duty period that count. In some cases, it’s 30 free from duty, but still 10/8 prior to starting a new one.

By the way, the interpretation linked does say it on page three. Read it again

teddy3412

Dude you continuously keep missing the fact that it says at least 10 hours immedietly prior. By saying at least it's saying it can be 10 hours or more. And numerous people have quoted the faa where it states that the 8 hour period has to fall inside that time off somewhere, me included. I'm just thinking your a troll honestly. Go ahead and call in for this reason one day and let us know that goes.

Flymeaway

Okay I read them, and I read them again, and again. In your defense, I can see how question 64 section 2 could absolutely mislead you. It was written to be as short and concise as possible and as a result is an incomplete response and doesn't fully reflect the actual text of CFR 117. However, an ALPA Q&A, while intended to be helpful, is not regulatory.

Additionally, the FAA letter of interpretation, page 3, is less helpful than it could have been, as it simply restates, basically word for word, the original text of CFR 117, without actually clarifying the potentially confusing language in that section, which was questioned by the petitioner, and is now being questioned by yourself.

However, after reading and re-reading the section of CFR 117 in question, I cannot interpret it to mean that the 8 hour sleep opportunity must occur in the final 10 hours of the rest opportunity as you propose. I agree with every other poster in this thread that the sleep opportunity must fall between the release from previous duty and report time of the succeeding FDP.

Vessbot makes a compelling argument in his grammatical analysis. Additionally, from a purely practical standpoint, it seems unreasonable for Congress to have expected pilots to spend 8 hours in bed within 10 hours of reporting for work when many times a pilot will simply need to complete a 3 or 4 hour FDP in the afternoon or evening.

Cujo, it seems you are in agreement with the rest of us that the FAA has no intention of pursuing action against pilots who have not acquired 8 hours of sleep within 10 hours of reporting for work. Whether you wish to interpret the CFR a certain way and call it "Don't ask, don't tell," or you wish to call it the FAA's interpretation of that section of Congress' CFR I suppose is irrelevant in the end.

In either case, I always encourage other pilots to view your own rest through the eyes of another. Whether you have the CFR required rest or not, if a disinterested observer of your life just prior to a mishap would conclude that you must have been fatigued, the FAA can still come after you.