if the pilot in question WAS over the limit the CPS would have him bang to rights and he would be prosecuted

I presume that someone thought he was over the limit, called the police, they rolled up and arrested him , removed him from the 'plane and only then tested him.... at which point it all became a little embarrassing as he wasn't over the limit

= buck passing on the usual scale

On the other hand he shouldn't have been anywhere near booze for at least 8 hours before flying so if he had had one (or two) he was playing with fire

HIMS/Alpha
 

Airbubba -- Interesting to note HIMS is an alpha.org scheme and requires AA. All of them require (cough) spiritual content. I believe in the USA an unquestioning belief in 'God' is more widespread than in the UK (or most of the so-called Christian Europe)? In the UK today the accepted medical treatment model is CBT and Mindfulness. A decade or so ago it was AA + CBT. Sorry, that's a bit of a digression but it does affect the conditions under which pilots might be accepted back into the cockpit. No bad thing for the pilot, family or wider society.

Recently a hovercraft ferry pilot of twenty years experience was found so drunk he couldn't complete the few miles from Portsmouth to Ryde. His cockpit colleague took the controls and was so unskilled he couldn't fly the craft up the ramp (I had one direct eyewitness report of the arrival; the fellow couldn't get the momentum needed and just fell-off the ramp each attempt). The pilot will never again fly a hovercraft and he seemingly has no other work-skills. The pilot took full responsibility for something that surely someone should have foreseen?

If you mention drink in the context of flying (or driving) and the perp gets a public lynching. Lynching is not a good form of justice, punishment or rehabilitation.

A and C
 

Outrage???
I was shocked that 170 was over the limit in one country alone, ONE!
And then seeing where in the world it was happening, I was not so much any more. Outrage? I simply made a short comment to an article and if it's not "shocking" to you, well then we have a difference of opinion.

I've flown commercially since 1989 and have been tested for my alcohol level one (1) time on a short stop in Amsterdam. I wouldn't mind if it was done more often, since I dont drink and fly and anyone that dont drink and fly wouldn't mind.

I agree that fatigue is a much bigger problem in generel. Just last week I checked in twice on ground freq. as it totally slipped my mind were we should go and park. (I actually couldn't even remember that I had made a call to ground)

Yup! And by the time we landed he was exhausted too. So was I as I was even more drunk than he was. Light aircraft in 1969 so we were less likely to be caught. It was a fairly erratic flight in that we didn't maintain a stable altitude. Out track was pretty good and the landing was on grass so we had quite a lot of leeway. I fell asleep in the terminal bogs but he drove home. I told the story a few times and everyone laughed. The pilot eventually lost his privileges for other reasons but was killed in a motor accident later on.

I look back with some shame at my drunken antics. What I am embarrassed about is tha fact I thought it funny. We drove under the influence. We flew hung over. We were pretty well the norm though. I remember more than once someone senior saying "for heaven's sake, get that man some coffee someone!"

Hey we were "men" doing manly things! I won't even start on the appalling way we treated women.

Lemain
Alpha certainly does a great deal of good work internationally but I'm unable to find any involvement in the HIMS scheme.

Are (cough) 'you' confusing Alpha and ALPA?

Alpha/ALPA
 

It looks like (cough) I'm going to have my eyesight checked...while I'm there I'll pick up something for this darned cough! :ok:

170 over the limit in 5 years?
 

Bear in mind, the limit on the pre-flight breath test in India is 0.00%

i have never been in an airplane with drunk pilot but i guess before take off its just right to test these pilot of alcohol so thy should be breathalyse before take off.. is it zero limit for pilots as well as FAs? is it different limit in every country? :) :ok:

Frequent headline
 

It's amazing how often a report like this pops up.
In the past three years I've seen both captains and first officers with drinking problems, drug problems and full blown addictions. The majority going undetected or unreported.

While those with the addiction think people don't know about it, many do but choose not to officially report it, instead speaking to the colleague in private and attempting to help them. It will always be a problem with the job.

Very correct IOS 331, BUT you should follow the SOP's and not just try and sort things out yourself!
Yep, pilots with drug abuse and serious fatigue problems have been responsible for a number of major accidents.
I even had one P2 turn up so drunk that he could not use the radio. The only reason I did not notice until it was too late to replace him was that he had reached the flight deck before I did and swallowed enough mints and mouthwash not to smell of alcohol.
He did get a serious verbal warning from me after the flight and I reported the occurence to the Ops manager. Oddly enough he gave up drinking after that incident, as the company we were working for paid well, with lots of time off and good hotels etc.

I had another P2 turn up so tired he fell asleep just after take off and slept for the rest of a long night flight. I even had difficulty waking him up just before landing.

Part of the reason why we get such incidents, apart from bad pay, insecure contracts and miserable working conditions, is that most companies have no effective pilots association.
A good pilots association does not get involved in anything pay related, as that would define them as a union, BUT they sure do get involved in taking action against any pilot who has a drug abuse issue or who needs to be retrained. Many of you might think that the Ops manager, EASA inspectors or even the Police should stop a pilot under the influence of drugs (Or serious fatigue) from flying, but in many airlines or Biz jet operations, the system fails. Sometimes the managers just don't care or can't do anything because they do not have a spare pilot available.

A good pilots association will also guarantee that if a pilot reports in as unfit for duty due to fatigue, that the "Yes men" who often get senior positions such as Ops manager don't fire them. In fact the one I was in some years ago was very effective and sacked a few chaps who the senior management thought were good (The senior pilots sure didn't). Ultimately a good association should be able to call a one day strike, but only over safety related matters, including poor training standards and I do remember a one day strike over tech log defects lists and another threatened walk out over a new training captain who needed more training himself.

The "Old boys" I flew with when I was a lot younger understood just how important a good pilots association was, the newbies don't and that is one reason why they are treated as virtual slaves.

"impulsive alcohol-related risk-behavior and emotional dysregulation amoung individuals with a serotonin 2B receptor stop codon"

Was published today on line in


"Translational Psychiatry ( 2015)"

Some may find this useful in their researches.

P..S. The Radio Officer mentioned in #120 and #127 WAS in fact a mandatory requirement for Trooping flights in the 1950s. H/F R/T was not sufficiently reliable, then.

LT