Originally Posted by
Hipper
If a captain knew a week before his regular co-pilot, say, would not be available, when would he look for a replacement? On the day of the flight, or earlier?
A copilot, as it happens, was the one non-essential member of a constituted crew. If a regular copilot was not available then the most suitable copilot would be allocated by the sqn planner but let's look at numbers. We have 11 to start with less our 'sickie' and in the QRA days two involved, and 2 on leave. That leaves 6. We can discount the one or two that flew late the night before, 2 others already rostered to fly that day and the one rostered to fly early the next day. Typically that means the replacement self-selects.