Personal Injury Blog

Unions Protest FAA’s New Pilot Fatigue Rules

January 3rd, 2012
pilot fatigue rules

The Federal Aviation Administration has released its new rules for pilot work hours, in order to reduce the incidence of pilot fatigue

The Federal Aviation Administration has released its new rules for pilot work hours, in order to reduce the incidence of pilot fatigue.

Those rules are definitely an improvement on the earlier rules, and come after a great deal of research into sleep and fatigue cycles affecting pilots.  However, pilots’ unions have already decided to challenge the pilot fatigue rules.

According to the Federal Aviation Administration’s new rules, passenger and charter carriers must guarantee their pilots at least 10 hours of rest between shifts.  Currently, the requirement is about 8 hours between shifts.  Some pilots, including those who work for commuter airlines, or those who perform multiple takeoffs and landings, or work during late-night or early-morning shifts, may have even more strict rules limiting their work hours.

However, the rules do not include all-cargo airlines.  The Federal Aviation Administration seems to have decided that the benefits of including cargo airlines under new rules, do not justify the increased costs of compliance.  Already, cargo airline unions have filed a lawsuit asking to be included in the new rules.  The Independent Pilots Association has filed a lawsuit on behalf of United Parcel Service pilots to be included in the new rules.  According to them, they need to be included in the rules because they are just as much at risk for fatigue.

Before the rules were announced, however, cargo airlines argued that the compliance of the rules would be too expensive for them, and that the rules would be difficult to implement.  Cargo airline pilot typically fly overnight to a variety of destinations that are frequently changing.  Therefore, cargo airlines argued that the compliance costs would be higher.  According to the Federal Aviation Administration calculations, exempting cargo airlines from the fatigue rules would save approximately $200 million in compliance costs over a decade.  The Federal Aviation Administration has decided that any benefits from getting all-cargo airlines included in the new rules, do not justify these increased compliance costs.

San Diego plane crash lawyers know that cargo airlines are typically involved in fewer crashes than commuter airlines, because these airlines operate far fewer flights.  However, it stands to reason that all plane pilots are impacted by the same physiological needs, regardless of the kind of planes they fly.  It therefore stands to reason that cargo plane pilots must also be subjected to the stricter work hour limitations as pilots for commuter airlines.

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