iarapilot

Man, you really get around. Joke lang!

Lifizgud

And the pairings seem to be getting worse. No matter how you try to get rest, seems like the beating is worse. Wish I had a switch I could throw to sleep sometimes...

Flaps50

I've never been as chronically fatigued as I feel after working here for a number of years now flying the Mad Dog international. I remember when I checked out before the contract thinking that the trips were manageable with the layovers we had, but after they turned up the optimizer and trimmed the layovers to get the cost down on the international trips it was light night and day fatigue wise. I remember thinking virtually overnight how much more tired I was after they implemented the shorter turns and added more 24 hours layovers in the March of '07 time frame. The problem is not acute fatigue for one pairing, but the accumulative effects after months and years of doing this stuff.

ptarmigan

All this talk of fatigue is fine and good, but what to the numbers say, do they support it? How do the schedules compare to our competitor, UPS, and similar carriers? How about the international carriers, such as Emirates?

How much flying were the accident crews doing before their events? Were they off for a significant period of time? Are crews that are flying more having more, or less events?

All of this discussion sounds good, but so does a lot of the stuff that comes out of Washington politicians, until you start to think about it.

Not saying it is or isn't, just that all is not always as it appears at first glance.

steel

Please be careful to compare apples to apples. What our scheduling team does/did may be far different than what other compainies do/did. In other words, what we are/were used to doing may be substantially different from what others are/were used to doing. Fatigue is a factor here. Twenty-four hour turns aren't helping anyone internationally. Asia flights Eastbound aren't helping either.

But what do I know? I love the job, but I'd like it to be safer.

JetJocF14

One thing I believe is that we might have done some of this ourselves. How many times have I heard I can't sleep in 24 hours I prefer either 18 or 36 hours. Then the company says OK lets try 18 or less. Figure a 1 hour show before departure, one hour drive, 1 hour for @hit, shower, and shave. Now that 18 dosen't look like 18 any more. The best your body can do is to shift its internal clock about 4 hours in a 24 hour rest cycle. Just thinking out load.

ptarmigan

Fatigue is a factor, but is it more of a factor, what is the effect of that factor, and how do all the various issues impact each other? Just asking the question. It is easy to point to it, but there are a lot of other factors. For example, someone says that they are more fatigued here than their previous job. Well, they are also OLDER now, than they were. How much is it the schedule and how much is the age? I don't know, just giving one example of how we need to look at all the factors before deciding that fatigue is the cause of our safety record. We could miss something major by deciding that fatigue is our scapegoat here without further research.

Lifizgud

Well, as a chronic RA holder, I can tell you that I've been right at RLG as long as I can remember, and since the normal "commuter" line is 5 days on x3 for the month, I can tell you that I get trips that habitually have a 24-hr layover, back to MEM for your "off for 10.5", then called again for another, and finally an AM O&B or 6HR trip to finish. The result is a continuous day/night swap, all for 8-9 hrs leveling, then back for a repeat. After 5 days you'll see maybe 22-24 hrs leveling for 5 full days of work. Do this all 3 times and magically, you work all 15 days and JUST reach RLG. According to my taxes, I made about 12% less money last year, but I've been working 50% more. I can honestly say I'm a lot more beat after this schedule, but hey! I'm being rewarded with less coin to take home...at least I still have a job...

golfandfly

Ptar,
I am not telling you that fatigue was or was not a factor with Fedex80. Let's not base this discussion on this one incident. I'll bet there were many fatigue related incidents that don't result in hull losses. Altitude deviations, runway incursions, etc., occur and don't make the news.

I can tell you I am much more fatigued than before, and have noticed the other pilots feel the same. Fedex is squeezing about all they can out of us these days. This is just my personal observation....

FDXFLYR

We don't hear guys calling in fatigued, why is that if the schedules are worse than they were pre 4A2b? Just talking about fatigue won't change anything, only when it costs the company money when a crew calls in fatigued, will something actually change.