Dumb Questions
 

As a regular passenger on Ryanair - and (apparently) one of the few people who has never been let down by them .... where do all of their planes go ?

I can see their timetables but experience tells me that individual aircraft do not simply shuttle back and forth between, say, Stanstead and Hahn.

- Who decides the routes that an individual aircraft will fly ?
- What is a typical route for an individual aircraft ?
- How many hours a day is an aircraft likely to fly ?
- How many hours a day is an aircraft pilot required to fly ?

I have no axe to grind. Am just curious that’s all :D

Can't answer for Ryanair, but in our case :

1) Schedualling initially assign a/c type for route, "theoretically ;)" taking into account a/c performance requirements (engine ratings, weight of a/c etc etc)

The pre-planning function takes care of what should happen in two to seven days time, taking into account a/c mx requirements etc.

Then ops "line-up" the a/c on a nightshift for the next day, taking into account all the above, plus last minute changes caused by a disruption / unserviceabillities etc etc etc.

2) Any route on the network taking into account the above parameters, or any unserviceabillities on a tactical basis (ie on the day).

For example, a inop APU means a/c can't fly to INV because they have no GPU support.

A typical day will see 'plan A' change on a regular basis to 'plan X' if it's a bad day.

3) Again, depends on carrier. We fly 10-12 sectors per a/c daily.

4) All contained within CAP371 & company FTLs. ( Keep away from this subject as it's a real bone of contention with flight-crew !!! :{ ) Basically there are set legal limits.

In a nutshell, as long as the crew are within legal limits for the duty, then they are required to fly.

Hope that this all makes sense ?? :confused:

Rgds.