One of the aspects of the FAID Fatigue Management System was the premis that a pilot shall not accept a flight when fatigued. Nicely exempts ops staff from any responsibility there.
When fatigued, a person is not always aware of fatigue (clouds judgement etc). So here we are with a situation of a tired pilot being asked to make an objective judgement as to whether s/he is fatigued when unable to make an objective decision.
If the pilot through subtle pressure of operations gets it wrong, the company/operations will wipe thier hands clean. Just what the insurance comapnies will have to say about though is a different matter. If the issues were brought up with them, then they might impose stricter duty/flight time limits.
From the 18 months I operated under a FMS system, I personally observed one pilot with 150 hours FLIGHT in the past 28 days (multi IFR charter). The highest I got to was 130, but that was spotting (VFR) and only a smidgin over the old CAO 48 exemption of 120.
From memory:
No need for days off.
Flight time not taken into consideration, just duty.
One can work from 0630-1230 365 days a year and not exceeed the maximum fatigue score.
Can have a 4 hour break between 9 hour shifts (then the next break must be 9 hours).
etc etc.
Kaptin M. We as professional pilots need a system in place that protects the worker. Other industries (Mining for example) have very strict OH&S standards in place to do this. Your putting the pressure on the pilot is akin to a mining company having a pool of uncovered hydrochloric acid in a busy area and saying that it's the employees' fault if they fall in. That sort of thinking is what goes on in the mines of that populous country to the west of you that looses 10000 people a month in mining accidents.
We pilots deserve a system of safety legislation to protect us.
CS