VLS with ice, your post #34 regarding GCAA flight time limitations is correct, BUT a Notice of Proposed Amendment (NPA) was made by the GCAA last year for CAR OPS 1 and was open for comments on 24 November 2014 with only 30 days to submit a response. The document is 513 pages long with quite a few changes.
The current CAR OPS 1 dated Feb 2014 on page 272 states what VLS says and is correct. However the new CAR OPS 1 NPA valid soon and ambiguous as to exactly when (look under NPA on GCAA website), page 288 makes ones eyes water and I’m sure the people in the bouncy castle are celebrating big on this one, there are three additional new notes in this amendment and Note 3 is the killer for cumulative fatigue in my humble opinion. New CAR-OPS 1, 1.1125 Absolute limit on flying hours Note 3 states;
A crew member is not considered operating crew member, during the time spent at his/her rest in an acceptable in-flight rest facility, or its equivalent under unforeseen circumstances, which will be reported to the GCAA. The duration of the flight rest time is not to be included in the flight time cumulative limits, but will be included in the Flight Duty Period Duty time for cumulative limits consideration.
As it goes the UAE airlines can say that they simply follow the regulator, but in reality the regulator is being driven by who?? I will leave that one to your imagination. Certain airlines in the ME have regularly been using the limit as a target plus a bit of dubious fudge factoring here and there as it suits. I personally don’t think any sane reputable medical professional that understands cumulative fatigue would recommend flying to these limits continuously as part of your career given the wide variable schedule we have nowadays. But then again you can always leave if you don’t like it.