Murexway, you're pretty hard on somebody suggesting a catastrophic incapacitation. We lost a Captain who had a heart attack rolling out in a DC-8 in Indy on 32 roughly 13 years ago. He started to drift off centerline and the F/O took control but couldn't stop it before they ran into the mud off the end. The engineer had to pry the guys hand off the thrust reversers. No movie, it can happen and it takes awhile to recognize incapacitation. Does your airline train for it? Mine does, although truth be told we always know its coming in training. It can be very ugly (ala JetBlue), it may come on slowly, or it may be very fast
Passenger 389- Nobody is being insulting saying fatigue might be a factor. It isn't like the guy said they planned to have a sleep and wake up on short final. Unless you've been there, done it, and got the T-shirt with back of the clock flying you don't know what it feels like.
Thanks 8driver for pointing the not so far fetched issue of sudden incapacitation and the important issue of fatigue. Having dealt with all sorts of rotating shifts, alerts, etc, I know how tough it is to switch from day to night and night to day, and still know up from down, left from right, not to mention just staying awake and concentrating during critical times. I'm guilty of getting Murexway and Passenger 389 to think, and it ended up hurting their feelings, and they responded impulsively, or they momentarily forget, that pilots have the same physiology as mortals, and are subject to falling asleep, or being incapacitated by illness, through no intent or fault of their own. I'm not used to taking people's feelings into account, when I'm trying to solve a problem, that is not of the heart. I apologize to him and her, for hurting their feelings. It was not my intent.