Flight crew rostering for lo-co 'long' flights

[Nicholas49]

Hi,

I wonder if there are any easyJet pilots who could answer my question.

If you are rostered to fly to one of the furthest destinations on the route, such as Gatwick to Hurghada where the flight time is 5h 20m each way, does the flight operate with two or three pilots?

I imagine you would only fly the two sectors that day, but surely flight time limitations would make this a very tight trip for a two-man flight deck, especially if there was a delay down route and the fact there are no crew stop-overs?

Cheers,
Nick

[Groundloop]

Don't know about easy, but UK FTLs allow a two man crew to operate up to 13.25 hours flight duty period for a two sector duty. This varies depending on reporting time and can be as low as 10.25 hours if reporting between 22.00 and 05.59. With proper scheduling Hurghada could be operated by a crew of two (of course, easy may have tighter limits by agreement).

A delay could be accomodated by exercising "discretion" to extend the duty period by up to 2 hours beyond the normal maximum allowed.

[I love twins]

All Ezy flights are 2 man (unless on a check flight).

Exactly as groundloop says re FTL. PLenty of time there if rostered properly. You can't start off knowing you'll go into discretion but obviously it is a tool to get you back should you be delayed down route.

[Nicholas49]

Thanks for the replies, very informative.

If the flight is operated with no relief crew you would, presumably, be totally stranded down route if one of the pilots could not operate the return sector for whatever reason!

Is the reason why there is a longer turnaround on those further destinations so that the crew can have a short break to stretch their legs before the return trip?

Nick

[potkettleblack]

I can't speak for EZ but at our outfit the longer than normal turn around times are to get refuelled, clean the aircraft and allow time for the cabin crew to get a break. By their very nature the longer flights will require a much higher fuel upload.

[Phileas Fogg]

Nicholas,

They'd be totally knackered if the didn't have the appropriate number of flight attendants down route, one F/A per 50 'fitted' seats on the aircraft, an airliner needs more than just a cockpit crew to operate!

[tom775257]

For what it is worth, I used to fly charters for Excel Airways (via another company, long story) from Birmingham, England to Sharm El Shiekh in Egypt in the A320. We used to lumber out above max structural take off mass burning fuel in the taxi to get below MTOM.

While I can't remember the exact ops manual requirements or JAR OPS, we used to have 2 captains and one FO. One captain would have to be right seat qualified so the FO could take a break. Also, as an interesting side note, the UK CAA was not happy with the number of diversions back from Egypt to refuel on the way up to BHX (typically Venice or Frankfurt Hahn), in the end we had to limit PAX numbers to reduce the number of diversions hence the number of flights that went into discretion.

[Daft Wader]

You can off course get permision from the UK CAA to operate something like a SSH as a "Level Two" operation.

This allows you to extend the FTL by a certain length as long as the strict rest requirements have been adhered too before and after the flight.

I think from memory the approval is for the airline , not the individual flight .

May the farce be with you

Daft Wader

:ok:

[Seat62K]

Don't/didn't flights from Gatwick to Deer Lake in Newfoundland (at some 2500 miles slightly farther than Sharm, I think) operate there and back without a change of crew? I think Astraeus used to operate weekly.

[BOAC]

Yes, AA did 'there and back' on Level2 rostering, but also used a pos return crew towards the end of the series, and a run of lay-overs.

[flyinthesky]

We operate Sharms and Hurgadas etc as a 2 man crew. Sometimes it is a Level 2 which stops factorisation etc, sometimes not depending on time of check-in.

It is a long day, but no real issue. Occasionally, discretion may be used but not all that often.

I love twins - you can use discretion prior to the first sector. It is only the 3rd hour that comes into play on the final (homeward bound) sector. So you can immediately extend your day by 2 hours from the start. However records of discretion usage have to be kept and certainly for us, if a route regularly needs discretion, it may be looked at in terms of rostering at a different time or occasionally a night stop.