Clearly I don't belong here from my nick but.....
For many years I travelled long haul and ULH on business , I felt tired in and occasionally dozed off in meetings , but I could always ask someone to repeat an issue or laugh it off, after all most of the other people at the meeting were in the same boat (another bad similie)
However you guys cant do the 'run that by me again' option can you and as well as fatigue the whole process of long or night flights does impact on your awareness and judgement. I almost built a career on untangling agreements that our lawyers proudly proclaimed -we were up 'til three am concluding this.
So I know that the freighter crews signed up to do a lot of night flying but that doesn't really mean anything because the affects are often subtle and insidious as exemplified by the remarks here about the change of pattern being worse than the long night duties themselves.
So I support the idea of some pressure on the carriers , why ?
1 I don't like to read about guys ( and girls) getting killed by what might have been a trivial oversight in a desk job, not because they are negligent but because of these subtle human factors
2. The safety record of the cargo industry is appalling compared to mainline Pax flights, how many wide body freighters have been written off in the last 5-6 years with little or no public or regulatory action - had these been pax aircraft the news impact would have been a thousand times greater,
3.I live near major airport and I would like to think I don't have one of these 'forgot to set MDA, failed to spot broken flight director, badly stowed freight incidents happen overhead my neighbour hood.
Again ,please Excuse me for butting in....