Easa Flight Time Limitations Changes
 

Are people aware that EASA are planning changes to FTLs that will apply to all European JAA Licensed flight crew, that will make your eyes water more than they do now?

There is an oppurtunity to comment on the proposed changes on-line which BALPA is pursuing but the take up seems remarkably low, on the EASA website, given it will affect every pilot licensed in Europe.

Just curious if people even know this is happening?

Information here

and comment here

BALPA says the EASA approach has not used any scientific data to come up with their proposal. They must have something that shows their limits are fair? How the hell would it stand up when challenged?

yep was brought up on the 28th Feb, however, the post seems to have been removed.

Fatigue
 

That document runs to 244 pages. Fatigue set in well before I managed to extract any meaningful information.

EASA Sub Part Q
 

Folks, this is VERY important,

I hate to sound like a head-teacher but every once in a while a rant is completely necessary.

For all BALPA members, visit the dedicated website at wakeup.balpa.org where you certainly wont need to trawl through 244 pages of information. The key points are summarised along with extensive guidance on what we can do about it. Granted it's not an easy process to comment but the hard work has been done by the BALPA guys/girls with scope for extra emphasis from individuals should we be so inclined, if not it's a cut and paste exercise.

For non BALPA members this is as good a reason as any to join. There's nothing to stop a non-unionised individual from registering to comment with EASA but without the sort of guidance we've received from BALPA the process is very daunting.

I'm sure as this thread progresses we'll be able to add detailed information about the changes we could all see to our working lives if these proposals are implemented in their current form. For now I'll wrap up by saying that this affects all crews regardless of type/airline across the EU, so get off you're arses and do something about it. I believe apathy in the pilot community is one of the contributing factors that has allowed P2F, and our deteriorating T's and C's to continue to be eroded to this day.

Rant over, normal service is resumed.

The document is long, however the duty time regulation is only a few pages long, 7 in fact. The rest is justification why did come to that specific implementation. Read it, comment it, and make your peers aware of it. If you think EU-OPS subpart Q is bad, think again, EASA OPS will be much much worse. And CAP 371 won't help you anymore as it will be automatically replaced.

Given that the plethora of legislation that comes out of Brussels has leaned very much to, some would say, the overzealous protection of the individual in all matters from food hygene to health and safety, just who or what 'dark force' is driving this EASA move that seems to go against all scientific opinion?

Granted, this is taken from an on-line encyclopedia:

The daily (lorry) driving time shall not exceed 9 hours. The daily driving time may be extended to at most 10 hours not more than twice during the week. The weekly driving time may not exceed 56 hours. In addition to this, a driver cannot exceed 90 hours driving in a fortnight. Within each period of 24 hours after the end of the previous daily rest period or weekly rest period a driver must take a new daily rest period.

Are these eurocrat buffoons seriously trying to impose working hour legislation that European lorry drivers don't even come close to? Follow the money, or in our case, the 'driver' behind these farcical proposals.

What? You mean .... the airlines? Well, who would have guessed? :rolleyes:

Just about everybody would have guessed - everybody! ;)

I would push back at this really hard if I were you. The misery is real if you let the likes of pencil bushing board of directors/accountants get away with this. The U.S. pilots have looked to the scientific CAP371 for years trying to get new rules, and finally acheieved some head way. Some of those regualtions look photo copied out of the FAA regs.

Danny CAP371
 

Back in the early 70s we (UK charter operator) applied the CAP371 trial Doc/Regs before it became law.

Even took the application to the sandpit with me, FAA 121 ops, even the FSO Inspector commentated "we need something like this in the US" That was 1981,
anything:ugh:

CAP371 is the Gold standard:ok:

The FAA generally leads, others follow.:ok:

It not only needs to be fought, the organisation and individuals responsible should be identified, pursued and removed from authority. With extreme prejudice, to coin a phrase.

I will put my tuppenceworth into EASA, as should all of us, however I don't beleive it will make a blind bit of difference. All the EU agencies come up with these farcical consultations and then just implement the regulations they first though of, regardless of the opposition, input or comments from those involved in the process. and why not, after all these are unelected bodies that have to answer to nobody and can and do, do as they please.

They do answer... to the electorate. MEPs are pushing this, elected almost by default by low turnouts from disinterested electorates.

This is an excellent example of how Europe affects our everyday lives, whether we like it or not and why we should pay attention to European elections with the same interest as we do national elections.

Perhaps we could have a Europe-wide expose of MEPs 'expense-gravy-train' in the same way as UK MPs have had in recent times!

Back to the subject - work your way through the EASA Comment Response Tool and have YOUR say about YOUR future before 20th March - you owe it to your career!

Reacting on this will take one or two hours,
however we need to act now , do it this week.

Two hours now will hopefully save us from hundreds of hours more per year.

We are becoming fatiqued and FTL's should become more restricted,
however for some reason EASA is coming up with this proposal.

BALPA is pulling us together via balpa.wakeup.org
React now as BALPA member or Trans National Member from other pilot unions
in Europe

Hopefully the other European Pilot unions are doing something like this as well? (French , Italian , Dutch , German ?)

Have a look at balpa.wakeup.org even if you are not (yet) a member.
Remember it is a proposal , we should act against it.

411A, you can stop being an antagonist on this one. The FAA are now actually looking at adopting many of the scientifically proven limitations from CAP371 whilst EASA and the MEP's supporting these new regs, with the backing of the operators, are looking to adopt the outdated and unsafe FAA regs in many areas.

I'll leave it to to thers with more spare time than myself to provide links to the articles that point to the long awaited FAA turn around on FTL's.

Frankly I am amazed that anyone would think of increasing the amount of flight/duty hours which we can do.

It just beggars belief that the legislators would fly in the face of all the scientific data.

I also hope that BALPA get this well into the media so that passengers know what is proposed.

This is important, so if you haven't already done so I would join the unions in encouraging you to visit the EASA website (EASA CRT application) and comment on their daft proposals.
You need to resister, log in, hit View Documents, right-click "OPS.055", then select "Add/Edit Comments".
It will take some time to trawl through and complete your comments (right-click on the right side of the screen and select "Add Comment", then click the Save button), but it's in everyone's best interests that we make ourselves heard on this one.
If you have access to the guidance from BALPA then their document tells you which paragraphs to click on and suggests suitable wording for the comments.

Depends.
On another thread is mentioned the number of hours VS crews operate on some of their long haul sectors.
Here it is...
Passengers demand cheaper tickets, airline shareholders demand profits.
Couple this with rising costs (and not just oil, either, the carbon trading sceme, increased landing and parking fees, increased taxes on air tickets, etc) it is simply necessary to increase FD crew productivity.
Like it or not, the gravy train has left the FD crew plush bygone station.
Accept reality.
Either that, or find another job...one that might have bankers hours, for example.

Influencing in Europe/EASA

I hope that someone in the balpa world is experienced at influencing in Europe.
A few odd thoughts.
1. Influencing in Europe requires multiple attacks. EASA itself, the Commission, the MEPs and even the UK Govt all need to be influenced.

2. Get named individuals. Not office holders. Named individuals in the EU world do not like being identified. Identify them, and publish their role. Let them know that if accidents arise, they will be pursued through the French Courts. (They are so much nastier to individuals than the british ones)

3. All EU and EASA officials are looking for their next EU/EASA job. Bear this in mind when "influencing" them. In particular, the top few Directors in EASA are dependant on "Community goodwill" for their next job. Remember that. EASA Directors will not fart without Commission approval.

4. Be very clear about who writes the drafts, who the decision makers are, and who will actually take the decision. Attack all 3 layers.

Good luck