Augmented and heavy crew ?

[tft]

Can anybody give me information regarding augmented flights (3 pilots) and heavy crew flights (double crew,4 pilots).
When to increase crew members on long haul flights ?
Is there a general rule or is it different between carriers ?
For example,is it decided by flight time (hours) or by nautical miles flown ?

safe flights

[Denti]

Quite a hot topic. It depends first on local regulations, some of them allow quite long flight duty time without the need to augment the crew (we do up to 13 hours currently). And then of course different regulations and different carriers use different rules to discern if a crew has to be augmented.

Although usually regulations allow a maximum time to be flown, some carriers use nautical miles as the measure when to use what kind of crew supplement. Nautical miles, if chosen low enough, has the charm that different cost indices cannot descide about crew augmentation or not. However it is really a carrier by carrier thing.

[casablanca]

In The U.S., under part 121 rules it is mostly based on flight time. Only 2 pilots are required up to 8 hours of flight time. If you have 3 you can fly up to 12 hours and anything above that requires 4. Also many company or union rules may be more restrictive.
Not having worked for a non US airline airline I will let someone else comment but I have seen the rules vary quite a bit from country to country.

[Mister Geezer]

We looked at augmented crews recently for a proposed trip, which in the end never materialised. It would have been a three sector duty and the extra third crew member would mean that everyone would only operate two sectors in the 'seat' and a sector sat down the back. Therefore in the eyes of the FTL scheme, the day could be slightly extended due to only two sectors effectively being operated by each individual and not three.

[Gulfstreamaviator]

Mr Geezer, if only it was that easy

There are several hoops that have to be jumped thru, before you can augment the 2 crew to get 3 crew FLT benefits.

I suggest you read the regulatory body publication, and if you are AOC your FOM.

The resting crew member must have a certain standard of rest area, away from the passengers, seperate heating and lighting, and ventilation, as well as the operator must have approval, in the FOM to conduct this exercise.

It is not possible just to say: go down the back and read and chat to the passengers, etc, etc.

Thats why longer range Glfs, can be config with a crew rest area, that complies with the regulations, and then that aircraft can opt for the 3 crew benefits.

I opperated one such grey 3 crew trip,a nd the company determined that the 3rd crew could sit in the jump seat, and as long as it had been rotated back, thru 180o and reclined it complied....

Or the other suggestion was to occupy an unoccuped passenger seat in the main cabin....

Not in my book, but then who was I to complain. The return leg was just 2 crew, and bu$$er the rules.

glf

[Mister Geezer]

Hi Gulfstreamaviator

We can do it as an operator. Not that we have done so yet but in the case outlined above it would have made the difference between doing the trip or not.

Cheers