it is a NO NO to be in uniform and to even be in a bar...unless it is a restaurant that serves food and the bar is incidental to getting to the food part.
again, this pilot is innocent until proven guilty...I am glad this happened in a civilized country!
the relief pilot is sometimes known as an international relief officer to allow segments longer than 8 hours to be flown. while another pilot is resting, he/she is in the cockpit doing their job. usually the pilot is in the cockpit for takeoff and landing too, another pair of eyes and that rot.
I think American elected to fly the flight to chicago with a stop in new york...the trip would then be less than 8 hours and they could operate with 2 pilots. Of course once in New York (neuvo york) a new crew would have to take over to go on to Chicago.
of course New York just had 26.9 inches of snow...we shall see how things go!
sadly, drunk pilots or accused drunk pilots are part of the problem of the downsizing of life for pilots...it used to be that if you had a problem, you called up someone and got up to a year off with full pay to deal with it...after that if you couldn't deal with it you could get half pay for a long long time rather than fly.
of course with problems , airlines (not american though...but not sure) have cut such things in one way or another...depression, alcoholism, hiding medical problems, will increase as benefits decrease.
regards
jon