EH
Been here for quite a few years now and been into disgression only once, and that was due to an unserviceablility down route. By the way, the Commander can only use his disgression to extend an FDP due to an UNFORESEEN DELAY. A flight that cannot be completed within the allowable FDP, because the flight time is simply too long, has been illegally planned. (FOM Chap 21 Page 5 para 2.2). That's why you saw that undignified scrambling around at late notice to use Annex 2 DUBAI(1) to get flights back from Shanghai when they changed from winter to summer schedule and dropped the 3rd pilot. If the captain was allowed to use disgression in this case they would simply have gone for that. The Company relies a lot on pilots not understanding the FTL and luckily for them a significant number don't. I think it is no coincidence that the interpretive notes in para 18 "Aircraft Commander's Discretion to Extend a Flying Duty Period", still say
"Guidelines - Detailed Guidance to be Added", and have done for over a year.
Vot to do??