Virgin have been using 3 crew for LHR-HK all year now. The 4th man is only required due to acclimatization reasons between HK and SYD. (VA operate LHR-HK-SYD-HK-LHR) The crazy thing is that the 4th man positions out from LHR in the back and then operates the sector back to London. Very useful to have a spare guy positioning in the cabin when you have just flown a 12 hour night flight as 3 crew and are approaching HK in typhoon season! Not!
This year, when they operated a second LHR-HK service it was actually rostered with 3 crew all the way around the trip.....with min rest of 14 hrs between pulling on stand in HK from SYD and take off for a 13 hour flight back to London. And to top it off, because this made the total time away from base shorter we all lost a rostered day off after the trip! Of course, union said they would monitor fatigue along with the company. Funny how no amount of ASRs or CHIRP reports seemed to change a thing!
That should tell you all you need to know about how airlines value pilot fatigue against the cost of his operating hours! If a buck can be saved in pilot hours costs and hotac it is always worth reappraising the safety aspect and rewriting the ops manual!
It's a slippery slope guys and we are all sliding fast.
NZ