cws1028

I know when the wording of H.R. 5900 came out there was talk of exceptions down to 1,000 hours for a frozen ATP with a four year degree in aviation as well as another one for the military, but recently I have not heard too much about it. Does anyone know if they are still in the works at this point?

mobius27

FAA released an NPRM proposing that in February of this year, comments closed in April. Someone emailed the FAA about it and posted their response here.

http://www.airlinepilotforums.com/av...-rumors-3.html

To sum it up, the FAA expects a final ruling on the Restricted ATP requirements in the Spring or Summer of 2013.

coryk

Once the comment period closed (in April), the FAA began reviewing what everyone had to say. The exceptions (1000/750) were simply proposed. Based off the comments, testimony, etc, etc the FAA will release the final ruling. Apparently that ruling was supposed to be out this month, however, someone on this forum emailed the contact at the FAA and posted her response which basically said the final ruling would be out spring of next year. I'm assuming they received more comments then anticipated.

HR5900 is still a go, so all pt. 121 pilots will need an ATP by August 2013, however, it is now up to the FAA to determine what is needed for an ATP. The 1000/750 proposal may stick, they may just keep the current ATP req's in place and offer no exceptions, or (what many think will happen) they'll lower those exceptions even more and tier it as well. So for example, 500 for aviation grades with a jet course, 750 for jet course OR aviation school, military, 1000 for this, 1250 for that, etc. That's what I heard from a friend who's been working on the HR5900 stuff in DC. So we'll see.

cws1028

Thanks. I'm a current CFI, but will miss the age requirement for the ATP by slightly under 3 months, so as far as I can tell, I'll have the 1,500 hours anyways by then, but have a lot of friends banking on these exceptions.

afterburn81

This is why pilots are their own worst enemies. Banking on anything in aviation is risky. However, banking on anything to lower the standards of a certain quality that effects the industry as a whole is a real bad idea. Tell your friends to maybe re-access their wishes. It's better in the long-run.

coryk

I bet it goes even lower than what was originally proposed.

ShyGuy

What a useless bill to fix the aftermath of Flight 3407. One pilot already had the ATP and the other was a pretty decently experienced CFI. I highly doubt that pilots having an ATP beforehand would have prevented the crash. These pilots were tired/fatigued, but from the looks of it, it was due to commuting, commuting through the night, and resting in a crewroom.

ExperimentalAB

Really? Fighting a stick-pusher is due to fatigue? Hardly...not that this bill will change anything, anyway.

coryk

Commuting on a redeye from Seattle!

I think they both had > 3000tt as well.

ShyGuy

From the sounds of the CVR, he had no idea what was going on. His actions have been concluded as those based on startle factor, and not thinking it through. They were alert enough to be talking pretty much nonstop, even below 10k. This accident was somewhat related to fatigue, but not based on their schedule. Both were tired from their commutes and their sleep in the crew room, with the FO flying while clearly sick. Not that I blame her, she financially couldn't afford to call in sick.

Yes, and not just a redeye from SEA, but a Fedex redeye. That means an initial redeye from SEA to MEM, wait a couple of hours in which you pretty much can't sleep, and then board another plane for a redeye to EWR. There's no quality sleep here. The CA's story is only a little better, he didn't commute through the night. But in both cases, their commute choices (one through the night) and more importantly, their sleep choices (crew room) led to fatigue that night. Their original schedule that day had a EWR-ALB turn and the accident flight to BUF for the overnight. The ALB turn cancelled. The accident happened on their first actual leg, with duty time being very low. It would have been an entirely different story if this accident was leg #7 on a 13:45 hr duty day. Then the industry would have screamed schedule fatigue. But as it happened, the commute+sleep issues was more so the problem.