Speaking of working harder or not... How long were your layovers on the 11 day trip? (Or, how many legs did you operate or dead head which paints a picture either way? Your next European trip has decent layovers and/or lots of operating legs? Just wondering. Thx!

 

Europe Z trips are mostly a crossing. Then weekday CGN night sort flying consisting of usually 3 to 4 legs a night with 12-14 hour day layovers. Then a weekend in CGN. Then more weekday 3-4 leg nights. Then a crossing home. Crossings are sometimes commercials (rare) or company deadheads or you’re operating.

 

To expand on flyguy’s post: Europe sort flying is busy. It’s go-go-go, get to hotel, sleep, eat, exercise, maybe quick minute for yourself, then right back at it. Don’t get to see much of the layovers, you only have a couple of hours at most. Usually fly back into cgn Fri night then off until sun night (mon am). Staying on US time zone is nice but you end up mentally tired out by the end of the week. The pace on the whale is way, way slower and you have ample breathing time even though you’re wiped from the circadian flips…

Also, Europe flying goes senior. Much less trickle down of EU trips to the junior as compared to Asia flying. I find the Asia flying easier for the most part as well.

 

^^^^^Thanks, great perspective on life on the road at this outfit!^^^^^

 

then how about intra Asia trips look like in terms of layover and operating legs wise?

 

For starters, in Asia there’s multiple hubs and you end up flowing between them. Flight times are longer (not doing short Western Europe hops) so there’s less legs in pairings and per duty day. Duty days seem longer in Asia trips as well. You’ll get more DH’ing in Asia trips.

You’re also on a different body clock. In Europe you usually show around late afternoon EST time (9pm EU) and finish around midnight to 1 am (6-7am EU). Asia you start around 9 am EST (9pm Asia) and finish around 6pm (6am Asia). For me, in Europe, I don’t stay up very long after getting to the hotel and I’ll wake mid afternoon which works good for getting an hour or more of sunlight doing something outdoors / exercise. in Asia I’ll stay up much longer than EU but it’s wasted time because you’re at the end of your day but stores and other things aren’t open yet. It’s also too late to exercise. Go to sleep closer to midnight (noon in Asia) and I usually wake up early evening = scramble for food before van time.

That’s the thing with UPS: anything good is always served with 2 sides of something bad. You just cant have a clean win.

 

Of course this is anecdotal, but my Asia trip started with a 2 day commercial to Japan, which I condensed to 1 day by taking a direct flight. The trip had 10 legs (2 to 3 per night in Asia) and ranged between about 15 hours to 53 hours rest between duty periods. And the trip ended with deadheads on company metal all the way back to SDF.

My Europe trip was only crossings.

 

Thats the best summation of our schedules I have ever heard.

 

What sort of seniority level gets you these trips? I would be planning on commuting from Japan so this would be ideal for me.

 

I have been here almost 4 1/2 years, not quite halfway up the seniority list in this seat/domicile.