Husband and wife prohibited to share cockpit
 

Couple pilots lost action against the company SATA: judges understood that passenger safety can be compromised if family ties overlap the hierarchical relationship. Expert in labor issues speaks in violation of constitutional provisions.

A banned pilots couple to share the plane's cockpit saw the Court of Appeal of Lisbon recently validated the airline's decision SATA Internacional to prevent husband and wife flying together. The litigation lasted since 2013 and has led to delays of several hours in air links with the couple trying to embark together without success.

Both the judges of the Labour Court as those reapreciaram the question after the couple have appealed the initial ruling, they were sensitive to the arguments of SATA in a case that the Civil Aviation Pilots' Union refuses to comment. "The type of relationship between members of the same household, including spouses, can more easily open gaps in vertical hierarchical relationship" between pilot and co-pilot, says the judgment of the Lisbon. What increases the risk for safety of flights, alert.

Called to rule on the issue as early as 2013 the then vice-president of the National Civil Aviation Authority (ANAC, which at the time was the appointment of INAC), Paulo Soares, expressed similar position, although less assertively. At a meeting of aerotracompany board, that intended solely to discuss this matter, and which was present as a guest, this commander wondered whether "vertical hierarchical relationship is or is not affected by the inseparable horizontal or relational parity relationship between spouses" They are working under the direction of one another, as was the case. "Family relationships can cause hierarchy failures," he said. Now questioned on the subject by PUBLIC, ANAC admits does not exist, nor in the national legislation or in international, no prohibition of close piloting the same flight. What is a general principle of rotation of crews "is the most warned on flight safety." The same entity is not aware of similar cases. At TAP, for example, there are no restrictions at this level.

Couple starred accident in 2013

Married for several years, the captain and his wife staged an accident when a plane piloted in early March 2013 had trouble landing in Ponta Delgada. There were no casualties, but repair costs - which were covered by insurance - budgeted 618,000 euros. It was after the accident that the company realized that the previous year the couple would have 85% of the flights together. The commander claims that, if they did, it was often for the benefit of SATA: "We were very called on off dutty days, when there was no one to fly."

The couple complains is being discriminated against in relation to other colleagues and undermined their right to family life, as with staggered schedules have less time to spend together. They sued the company, which asked for compensation of 20 thousand euros, and can return to man the cockpit simultaneously. "Much worse is people who do not speak are climbing to fly together - and this continues to happen," contends teh captain.

However, the judges concluded that, although they should be provided to workers conditions for reconciling work and family life, "it does not follow that this interest must prevail over the interest of flight safety of the community."

"Does not meet the court ascertain the goodness of this measure, given that the same is shown justified and seems proportionate to the objective intended: compliance with safety rules," can be read in the Labour Court's judgment, with which the prosecutor of the Court of Appeal which examined the case agreed .. "it is natural to be excused," among close relatives, "small flaws that can be fatal for those who have the fate of so many lives in your hands," wrote the latter.

Expert in labor law, the lawyer Garcia Pereira is shown shocked: "Both may be a breach in the hierarchical relationships between husband and wife and between boyfriends. And if glasses of companions? ? The company makes them a test of friendship "asks, adding that this type of decision paves the way for discretion - in addition to violating, in his opinion, several constitutional provisions and the European Convention of human rights, from unwarranted intrusion in life people to the principle of equality between citizens, through the reconciliation of work and family life

We have/had several husband/wife and father/son pairs employed at my airline. They are allowed to fly together.

Is the issue not more to do with the fact that they flew together well above the average norm? With larger airlines the likelihood that pilots who are related fly together is generally quite limited.

I wouldn't let them fly together anymore either.

Would the prohibition apply to same-sex couples?

No, It would be minority discrimination

If they "staged an accident" I can't understand why they should be allowed to fly at all. Whether it resulted in aircraft damage is not relevant given it was an apparently intentional act. If there had been casualties, then what would have happened?

I don't think they actually "staged" the accident... simply a translation error from the original article (in Portuguese) to English.

My wife and I had a couple of expensive accidents in the past. But they've both left home now.

It would seem that couples (happy ones) without children living at home would probably prefer to fly together as much as possible, because then their days off would be more likely to coincide.

This is a nice one:
Let's make a list of "risky" combos in the cockpit!
Lemme start:

A divorced couple :)
two captains
Flying with Yr chief pilot
Flying with Yr chief instructor
Flying with the airline's owner
Flying with a chap who ran off with Yr wife (although for some that would be reason for good friendship)
Flying with an FAA (or likewise authority) pilot
Two pilots sharing the same hobby
Two pilots without any hobbies
Two pilots who are interested in the same C/A

The list must be endless....

VP of Operations and Director of Flight Safety :}

Am I the only one that generally finds such a stance to be just a bit misogynistic in nature?

:}

A small UK airline has operated a father / son and also a husband / wife pair as the flightdeck crew.

I would not be happy to be flown by such a combination.

It's not just about family ties.
How about pilots that are unrelated but hate each other? There are endless scenarios, that might turn out the be tricky. Faith, mentality, sex, former military, expats, you name it. Part of a pro mindset to still act responsible.

Very narrow minded I have to say Basil. There are a lot more dangerous potential pairings than a husband/wife father/child combination.

I don't enjoy flying with pilots of pure civilian extraction.

I also don't like native English speakers - because our operation being in the English language, they al ways think they are right because of that fake superiority.

I also prefer the F/O to be of the same faith than me - because it's the true one.

Therefore the three previous combinations are a safety risk.

I spent 3 years flying with my wife as my F/O and she was the most professional F/O I've ever flown with. If anything, we overcompensated on discipline and SOP adherence because we knew that there'd be plenty of "I-told-you-so" if we screwed anything up. We had a simple rule, what happens at work stays at work and what happens at home stays at home.

It's absolutely a non issue

There is an important issue that must be taken into account on this topic, (and I assume it has played a paramount role on the court ruling decision): this particular crew was involved on an aircraft accident in which CRM was a factor – “CRM principles were not evident during this event”, it is stated in the accident report under Conclusions Evidence.

Although this evidence finding was not developed nor any recommendation elaborated on it (a clear “gap” on the report, on my own opinion) what would anyone with management responsibilities on the company would do?

The answer looks clear to me…

I spent all my career working in 'small' companies where we flew with the same Skipper / FO combinations very, very regularly.

During those years, my own experience was that there were good pairings and bad pairings, for a whole variety of reasons ( personality, history, culture and others ) and that a night working in a 'bad' pairing was a horrible night's work.

Same for a husband / wife pairing I suppose - some days or nights would be better than normal, some worse than normal, all depending on what's been going on during the two or three hours together before Report Time.

But I'll have to say - I'd find it difficult working with wife / son / daughter in a cockpit environment if my family are anything to go by and we class ourselves as normal....

I have flown together with both my brother and my wife many times, and find this a absolute non-issue.
Like Luke says; if anything, we tried harder to be professional when we flew together.

My outfit has several husband+wife pilots. Some choose to fly together, others avoid it. There have been issues on a few occations, with one h+w disallowed to fly together for the last couple of years.

In some cases the wife is senior i.e. the Captain. Now how about that...

Actually, of the few married pilot couples I know, a common scenario is that the wife was a flying student of the husband at one time. Years later the wife gets hired by the airline but the husband can't even get an interview. 'The curse of the white male' as one of my female colleagues puts it. Women and other underrepresented demographics are actively recruited and often hired with much lower experience levels than 'majority' applicants.

In more than one case I can cite, the wife goes to work in the training department and eventually is able to help get the husband an interview and a job.

I know of a couple who were divorced and flew together once or twice. I would have thought that would have made for an interesting crew, but he said there were no problems.
I flew with my son a couple of times, we had a great trip with no problems and I was a very proud dad!:)

Unless the girlfriend was working in the cabin it should not be a problem flying with the wife ?

Isn't the unspoken issue at hand professionalism?

I'm wondering if the relevant issue may be the airline's exposure to litigation in the event of an accident, given lawyers ability to make mountains out of molehills.

are you serious? or are you trying to be flippant?

I do believe recceguy was indulging in a spot of irony ;)

Thanks, I was trying to work that out too!

I seem to remember that Air UK employed and rostered together an Iranian captain and an Iraqi first officer around the time of or not long after the Iran/Iraq war. Don't think there were any problems.

Here is the acc. report.

http://www.gpiaa.gov.pt/upload/membr...os/i006503.pdf

One thing I find interesting in context to the courts ruling:

Interesting you should mention that.
Recollect having a beer or three in HK with that combination, but both captains, as they indulged in some mil humour about what would have happened had they met.
Actually would have been little doubt; one was Hercs and the other fighters.

Think I read somewhere a few weeks ago that Thomson jigged their rosters around a bit so a father and son could crew a 787 before the father retired, may even have been for his last flight. Lovely story I thought.

As a passenger (self loading cargo)

If I knew, I would like to have a Man and Wife in the cockpit that would do everything to prevent either one being hurt as this would of course extend to all others on the aircraft. What the hell is the problem?????

I'm sure sometime, somewhere, there has been a tanker captain who was the wife of a receiving thirsty fighter pilot. That scenario could lead to interesting anecdotes.

The original incident:

Accident: Sata A313 at Ponta Delgada on Mar 2nd 2013, tail strike on landing

The problem is/was not their relationship, but the fact that they paired for 85% of their flights. Trust & familiarity inevitably leads to complacency and relaxed monitoring, regardless of relationship. Being paired with a competent stranger is the safest combination, as both sides will be alert to what the other is doing.