good points lighening. I have one more to add.

Rest requirements should be based off of duty time not just flight time.

Absolutely! For everyone who works at a company where this is the norm, when your contract negotiations come up, you need to fight tooth and nail for 8 hours BEHIND THE DOOR.

If you're tired, all the pilots should fill out a NASA form online and flood the system with fatigue forms. Fill one out every day you're tired or even for every leg, someone on the other end should get a clue. It worked for the library in Shawshank Redemption.

or 10 legs hand flying in the northeast in a j31 or b1900:)

As for 121.471: You've got to lobby alpa to stop supporting labor 'friendly' positions that end up throwing pilots under the bus:(

You either didn't watch the video, or you missed the part where they talk about f/o's having other jobs on their days off to make ends meet, which, if you've ever worked another job while doing this, you'd know that it will start taking a toll on your mind and your body. Thus affecting situational awareness, crm, cognitive thinking, you see the connection now? Or should I illustrate it a bit more. I was one of the lucky ones, I had savings to compensate during my first six months, I only had to get a job for the second six months of my first year, I can tell you from personal experience it was extremely tough on my mind and my body. I was one of the fortunate ones, I work for a company that has pretty good work rules. Now couple my previous mentioned situation with a company that has questionable work rules, and you got yourself a potential hazardous situation every time you go up.

Lighteningspeedthe SINGLE MOST threat to safety is pilot fatigue directly caused by regional airlines managements' scheduling practices.

It's not just a regional problem.

Cargo, major airlines, 90K and 135 too.

StillLearningYou've got to lobby alpa to stop supporting labor 'friendly' positions that end up throwing pilots under the bus:(


Alpa's own guidelines for duty times and rest encourage employers to pressure crews to part 91 repo fly well past the 121.471 limits.

Question: Does the hill at the approach end of the runway care if you are carrying passengers or goods for hire?

LighteningspeedTime for REST PERIOD should start when crews check in at the hotel for the night.

This would be good in theory. But tell me you don't know 1 pilot that would ask the van driver to stop at a convenience store or restaurant on the way to the hotel and oops! we can't show for tomorrow morning's flight on time, we signed in 1 minute late.

True, however after a long day of flying with not enough time to grab a meal, we usually have the taxi/shuttle driver stop off somewhere so we can grab something to go. That eats into my rest. Lately I've been going all day without eating because there's no time and the airports we go to don't have any food to buy. I am always starving and looking forward to my meal after I finish flying. I've been packing pop tarts and other snacks too since that's all I really have time to eat during the day.

I've been carrying a lunch kit for years now, and it saves me an average of $150 a month. Usually I'll pack tuna meals, instant soup, rice pouches, power bars, fruit (when not flying out of the country), beef stew, crackers, PnB sandwiches, you name it. It really makes a difference when trying to save money, and when running tight on time. Oh and Oat meal is a good late night snack, and you don't have to worry about putting on the pounds.

As far as the original post is concern, another thing to consider is why didn't these guys (BBC) consult ALPA or the NTSB on the fatigue issue? Going to the RAA proved to be as useful as going to the Boyd group, nothing but bias management nonsense.

It's easy to poke fun, but I am sure those 4 legs involve a 16 hour duty day with scheduled sits in all the best palces with wonderful facilities to rest.

Then you and the rest of your pilots need to call fatigued everytime they schedue somethign like this. If each and every month the flight are delayed and cancelled because crew planning builds a schedule that results in too many fatigue calls.... guess what... the schedule gets changed.