M609:
You mentioned "...nails in the coffin..", or such.
A reminder here about US-style bureaucrats.
The only time that the US FAA, also known as the 'Tombstone Agency'
, reacts to an accident and then allows vital changes (i.e. requiring that a standby/reserve crewmember have an 8-hour period in each 24-hour period free from duty or phone calls) in the regulations to take place, is after a lot of people die in an airplane. For example, after the tragedy at Little Rock, Arkanasas (MD-83), the FAA decided to limit the duty periods of pilots. But if they go from flying freight or people to flying an empty aircraft, the duty rules do not apply. The known (to the FAA , BEFORE the crash at Roselawn, IN) problems with the ATR-42's wing de-icing boots etc are just one more example.
This will and has not happened when a freight airplane crashes etc, even though the primary cause for the DC-8 accident at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba was largely a result of a very long standby period with no rest before the flight. This was the NTSB's conclusion, and the first time that it stated that crew fatigue was the cause.