Where does this leave Professional Pilots ??

[PowerRanger]

Sorry chaps but there seems to be huge missing of a few important points here.

SOPS - Hart wasn't found 'guilty of not having sleep' as you assert but guilty of causing death by dangerous driving on 10 counts. See if you can spot the difference.

Lovely Morning - It isn't CRIMINAL to be up all night. But it is CRIMINAL to be up all night and then drive your LandRover/Trailer combination 65 miles in 70 minutes (a time a trained police driver with a police escort could not match) and then nod off and be directly responsible for the deaths of 10 men.

Hart was a 'mobile disaster waiting to happen' according to a member of the invetigation team.

He lied about sleeping when in fact he had spent most of the previous night chatting up some woman. He had already hit the kerb through weariness earlier in his journey and had stopped to have coffee to make himself more alert.

He drove beyond the speed limits in a highly fatigued manner and ultimately robbed children of their fathers, wives of their husbands and mothers of their sons.

Yes he's criminal. Yes he deserves to be punished heavily and no 10 years is not enough. Only one year per death?

Take notes people. You have a choice. It is called personal responsibility and it goes hand in hand with rights. You can't have one without the other.

If you fly KNOWING that you are too fatigued to fly and as a DIRECT result of that cause the death of people then you don't deserve sympathy you deserve prison.

You are professionals. Act professionally. Don't hide behind the 'I was just following orders' line.

Perhaps if one of those killed was connected to you, you'd be less arrogant about the matter.

With 10 years Hart will get off light.

His children still have a Daddy.


Edited for spelling mishtakes.

[ 14 December 2001: Message edited by: PowerRanger ]

[5by5]

Err, with respect to 'he had spent most of the previous night chatting up some woman' and 'have coffee to make himself more alert', does that sound familiar to anybody else ?!

[katiecorrigan]

Re Lawyerboy's post, and putting aside the fact that some choose to do jobs with erratic hours.

Have you ever tried sleeping through the day, trying to get enough rest before a minimum 8-hour duty starts at 5pm? When it's daylight outside, when doorbells or phones ring continously, when children are playing outside, when neighbours are cutting their grass, when the other half needs to be doing the housework? Earplugs don't work that effectively. You can't have a drink or take anything from a chemist to help you sleep because of the 8-hour ban on drinking before duty starts.

It's damn difficult but one's life outside the airline (or any other job involving constantly changing shift patterns) goes on, that's why some people will be awake from 6am in the morning even when standby doesn't start until 5pm. But usually not through choice.

None of this really justifies the actions of anyone who causes an accident when they've been awake and working for 24 hours or more, but it has to be taken into account.

Katie C.

[had_enough]

Power Ranger - the point the "expert" made was that having had very little sleep in the previous 24 hours, Hart, should not have been driving. Having had very little sleep in the previous 24 hours should I be flying ? Hart didn't choose to nod off and have an accident.

I agree about being Professional,however, with no professional support from the authorities I am faced with "it's legal - are you refusing the duty" - and the Company has shown what happens if the response is not to their liking.

Where do I go from here - not sure - tried all the avenues I can think of... and yes leaving is an option.

[Human Factor]

Just a thought, I can't sleep on command. If I'm tired I can sleep, if I'm not I can't. It's that simple. I cannot put my head down during the day to ensure that I'm properly rested for the evening unless I'm already tired. Just one of those things I'm afraid.

I sincerely hope that I always make it home - I have practically fallen asleep at the wheel before on a couple of occasions after a duty. It is not a pleasant experience and I have been extremely lucky.

Some people may consider me foolhardy for putting myself in that situation. As someone has already said, it's illegal to stop on the hard shoulder unless it's an emergency so my options were a little limited. (Not driving was not a viable alternative).

Something must be done, ie. HOTAC or a driver, to alleviate this situation. Otherwise, let's hope that BALPAs legal protection is worth my 1%.

[Donkey Duke]

Why is it that most of these British guys who fly for the charters and have to do all nighters to Tenerife always live 90 miles from the airport? Why not move a little closer until you can hold a better schedule? That extra 90 minute drive home
in morning traffic makes you dangerous to everyone. Homes and flats closer to the airport are also cheaper, but there is an extra expense in additional ear plugs.

Thanks. Donkey Duke

[Devils Advocate]

Donkey Duke, with respect to 'hold a better schedule' by that I assume you mean from a ‘bid’ ?

If so, the problem is that UK airlines don't normally use 'bidline' rostering (coz it's expensive on crews), so we are not able to bid for certain preferred routes (and you can re-read Lovely Day's post above for the effects of that), and whether you live around the corner, or 90 miles away, it still doesn't get around the fact you can be awake all day (as per Katie C's post above) and get called in off standby for a heavy night flight - with little or no prior warning, such that you could avail of some sleep, even if you could have actually achieved some - the with effect being that you might still have to be awake for 24 hours, albeit that’s just slightly better than 26.

E.g. Monday - drive to work to start mid afternoon with 5 sectors, finish close to midnight, stay in hotel.
Tuesday - wake up at 6am (other guests making noises), leave hotel at midday, do 5 more sectors, finish back at base at about 10pm and drive home (at least the roads nice and quite), in bed by midnight.
Wednesday - wake up at 6am (just can't sleep) and spend rest of day doing the normal stuff that we all do prior to starting standby at 5pm - the rest you know.

So let's say that I don't manage to get any shuteye during the afternoon (I tried but couldn't)..... should I call in sick ? or plead fatigue ? .... but it was a 'legal' roster, and the company 'assumes' that I should have got some sleep..... now is that my fault, or the rosters ?
Perhaps I should now take the view that if I’m even the slightest bit tired I should call in sick, and let some other poor schmuck do it instead ? So what’s to do ?

[matsaysgo]

I agree with most of what is said here and as i am sitting here in a dark house with the family asleep suffering the ground based jet lag of shift workers it makes me think as well. I too had the drive home yesterday with sudden shocks on the motorway. The enevitable horns at the traffic lights and peers from other sensible drivers as they go past.As an LAE i am in the background most of the time and can remember all too well the many 24 hr + shifts due necessity. I force myself to get rest before duty and still suffer. The plain facts are, nightshift is against what the body wants to do. It is an enevitable evil though.
The company i am with drive the flight and cabin crew to and from work, alas that does not help my colleagues and i but it is a sensible choice after a long night duty.
Maybe you guys could negotiate the company providing transportation for you after a night flight in the same way that the company i work for does

[matsaysgo]

I agree with most of what is said here and as i am sitting here in a dark house with the family asleep suffering the ground based jet lag of shift workers it makes me think as well. I too had the drive home yesterday with sudden shocks on the motorway. The enevitable horns at the traffic lights and peers from other sensible drivers as they go past.As an LAE i am in the background most of the time and can remember all too well the many 24 hr + shifts due necessity. I force myself to get rest before duty and still suffer. The plain facts are, nightshift is against what the body wants to do. It is an enevitable evil though.
The company i am with drive the flight and cabin crew to and from work, alas that does not help my colleagues and i but it is a sensible choice after a long night duty.
Maybe you guys could negotiate the company providing transportation for you after a night flight in the same way that the company i work for does

[Vmike]

It's all very well trying to sleep in a hotel room if you happen to be downroute. All you have to contend with there is cleaners banging around outside the door all day! It's far worse when you are at home.

When you're at home, people assume you're awake, so they phone you, drop in for a cuppa etc. Then there's the kids who suddenly find Daddy's home, "yippee, wake up daddy, let's play bouncing on your bed".

[Arkroyal]

The acid test will be when one of our employers is held to be responsible for the next Selby.

Here's an example of dumb but legal rostering.

I know next month I'll be in the simulator from 0300 - 0900 in a nearby foreign country. Before that I've got two days off, so I could stay up late, sleep in and acclimatise myself quite nicely, couldn't I? No, because on the day before the sim, I have to report at 0630 to position to the foreign country, stay in a noisy hotel and 'sleep' before doing the sim sesh,then go straight to the airport to fly back to base and then, you've guessed it....drive home.

's OK though, it's only the busiest motorway in the UK and if I drive fast enough, I'll only expose the public to half an hour's worth of my crap, sleepy progress!

Back to Selby, it smacks to me of the well known Chinook accident at the Mull. Had that aircraft simply killed the crew, the enquiry's verdict of 'no known cause' would have been accepted, just as this hapless bloke veering off the road into a tree would have raised no eyebrows. The idea that the horrendous consequences somehow alter the cause is a nonsense.

[Vmike]

After a long duty or, worse still, a split shift, the decision you have to make is this: Do you drive fast, and hope to get home before you fall asleep, or do you drive relatively slowly, and stand a better chance of surviving the inevitable crash?

Tough one!

[PowerRanger]

Arkroyal hello, planet Earth calling!!

So the number of deaths changes not the magnitude of the crime?

Go tell it to the Jews. Go tell it those affected in New York. Go tell it to The people of Omagh.

And then wake up.

Of course there is a difference between running off the road into a tree and what happened at Selby.

In one instance you are the only one that suffers from your actions but in the other innocent people are given no option but to pay with their lives for the mindless stupidity of one man.

If you need me to point this out to you you shouldn't be allowed out alone let alone in an aircraft.

[crackerjack]

5by5 - very true, who hasn't been there!!!

PowerRanger - What are you LIKE.

[Kaptin M]

An interesting thread, however I'm more than a little surprised that the "core" of this discussion has evolved around fatigue affecting pilots, during their car journey home after work.
Surely the next progression to this court ruling, would be similarly charging crews who have an accident following a flight that was undertaken without adequate rest - whether it was an all-night flight (which had probably commenced at a sign-on time of around 2100 local), or a day flight undertaken in a foreign country without allowance for "jet-lag" (the body clock's 'home time', ie Circadian rythm).
How many times approaching the end of an all night flight have I thought to myself, "If only the pax (who have probably managed to grab a few hours sleep) knew how much like sh!t I feel like NOW! (Tired, dry eyes, heavy eyelids, and that yearning to just sleep!)

Some people, such as I, are inherent early-risers - I wake at 0530 in Summer, and 0600-0630 in Winter, without an alarm, and regardless of the time I go to bed the previous night - making those night flights "nightmares".
Other individuals are late risers and kick on through until 1 or 2 in the morning - however, NO-ONE (except insomniacs) are still USUALLY awake at 4 or 5am.

Likewise, for those wishing/needing rest during the day, prior to duty, it may simply not be possible where both parents of children are working.

The answer for employers isolating themselves from the prospect of any court action in the event their employee is involved in a road accident, is an easy one - provide transport to and from work, or make rest facilities available following work at home base.

Two crew complements on, all-night ops flying between 2300-0700 should be MANDATORY regardless of sector length...for SAFETY'S SAKE!!

[chrisN]

Seems to me (amateur pilot, not professional) that two things may be needed to address the issues raised:

1. Regulations covering hours worked/report times/time off/normal sleep patterns etc. need to be changed - not by individual pilots fighting your ops mangt etc. (risk to job) or by "industrial action" within your company (ditto risk), but by Parliament. That means telling your MP's what the implications of Selby are in the real world you guys/gals are in, and getting them to do it for you. You would probably need an organised campaign to register enough potential votes to make MP's sit up and take notice.

2. Everyone who drives needs better rest facilities on motorways and trunk roads. E.g. French motorways mostly seem to have alternating rest areas ("aires" - parking/loos only) and full service stations with fuel/food/drink every 10 km. This might be a campaign that AA, RAC, Institute of Advaced Motorists, RoSPA, various unions, and others would have reason to join in.

By the way, [CHIRPS mode on] I think I am lucky not to have had an accident of this type; e.g. (a) three nights ago I was on the M11, started feeling drowsy, had nowhere to stop from Stansted to A11 (15 miles), and at one point woke up to find I was overtaking a truck which to my last recollection had been some way ahead of me. E.g. (b) once when flying a glider solo, I started feeling drowsy, headed back to the airfield from about 10 miles away, and at some point became aware that I was over a village I could not remember approaching. I don't mean the "driving on autopilot and can't remember" syndrome, I mean a micro sleep (as I believe its called). [CHIRPS mode off.]

I would go so far as to say that most people fall into only two categories - those who have had lucky escapes, and those who haven't yet.

[AffableGuy]

It's sad, really. Fly, and risk having an accident, either inflight or on the ground. Don't fly, and risk getting left behind, or even outright release.

Most, in their right frame of mind, would say that the latter is obviously the more logical choice, given that any loss of human life is definitely not an attractive option.

But when you have to do this on a consistent basis because of rostering requirements, where do you draw the line?

I find it quite disheartening myself...

[2500]

A few nights ago I was positioned back to my home base in an aircraft after a long multi-sector duty involving a diversion. The off duty time was a little before sunrise, having been on duty since lunchtime the previous day. The whole crew protested at the scenario on the basis of fatigue and the likelyhood of facing a drive home in the fog. Crewing's response: I can position you anywhere in the world after a flight duty. There is no limit on positioning.

The problem is that crewing work to CAP 371. The have no interest in the safety of the individual, only the legality. As far as I am concerned, the employer has a duty of care under the Health and Safety regulations and it is this that should be addressed.

[kippa]

WOT 3 pages long and no GUVNOR.

Looks like management don't like this thread.

[MAXIMOL]

Write to your MP. Lots of examples here...Probably lots more and loads of times where people have got away with it. Well yuo can get 10 years for falling asleep at the wheel through lack of sleep! Time to start letting people know about what we do. And I don't just mean landing an aeroplane in s**t weather in the dark, etc after no sleep. And indeed no proper sleep for a couple of days sometimes!!
http://www.locata.co.uk/commons/

This website gives details of who you MP is and how to get in touch with him or her, even by e-mail.