FAR 117 being re-worked?

ATN_Pilot said:
Of course they can be questioned....by people who are qualified to do so. That ain't you. Opinions of laymen are irrelevant in a system based on science. And if we look in this thread, we can see what most of the "opinions" revolve around: "efficiency" and how people like their schedules for pay and day off purposes; not safety.
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Come on man, this is a site designed for people to have these exact kinds of discussions. If we all just discussed opinions about things that we were highly qualified in then it would be a pretty quiet site.
 
ATN_Pilot said:
Of course they can be questioned....by people who are qualified to do so. That ain't you. Opinions of laymen are irrelevant in a system based on science. And if we look in this thread, we can see what most of the "opinions" revolve around: "efficiency" and how people like their schedules for pay and day off purposes; not safety.
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Well, let's step back and look at the discussion @Dan208B and I were having about inflight rest breaks. If you read it strictly, it does appear that the flying pilot is meant to take the last rest break in augmented ops (though I have a different opinion of what "available" means, I'm no lawyer).

Now, I'll be honest: Because of sleep inertia, nobody takes the last rest break. I've done it once, and it wasn't fun showing up to fly at the top of descent bleary-eyed. Everyone takes the middle break; you can get your sleep in and still be wide awake for landing. While I'm certainly no sleep scientist, I am a long-haul pilot who knows how it works. My opinion is extremely valid, as are the opinions of professional pilots everywhere who have to operate under these rules.
 
SteveC said:
@amorris311 and @jtrain609, I don't think that you are addressing the point of my discussion. I am not opining on whether or not the rules are good, bad, indifferent, nor whether or not they should be changed. All of my posts have been responding to one point only. That point is


My contention was, and continues to be, that just because rules are based on science does not mean that they should not/cannot be questioned.

I have never stated an opinion on the 117 rules themselves.
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I'm not entirely sure if you're trying to be cute or serious, but let me approach this as if you're being serious. Mark, I believe, is likely treating you like you're being cute and hence, I believe this is why you're getting the attitude from him. Being that I can't tell what your intent is, I can't exactly blame him (or said another way, maybe you could try to be a little more clear cut and a little less laconic).

If you're saying that people's opinions should be supplanted for hard metrics that have been found out through the rigors of the scientific method, then I can't agree with you. Opinions, as you know, are like •, and I have no intention for these rules to stick.

If you're even arguing that opinions vary on whether these rules should be implemented due to variance in opinions, then again, I still think that stinks.

It stinks because we're talking about a fiduciary responsibility to the public for our industry to behave like adults, not academic points to be argued over beers.

But frankly, Joe likely just made the point most succulently; opinions don't supplant scientific rigor.
 
PhilosopherPilot said:
Come on man, this is a site designed for people to have these exact kinds of discussions. If we all just discussed opinions about things that we were highly qualified in then it would be a pretty quiet site.
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I'm not going to back Todd up on anything, ever.

But you can't tell me you haven't beat your head into a wall trying to explain safety systems to people here, and wondered why they wouldn't just listen to what you're trying to say instead of trying to be intentionally difficult.

I think that's the point, if there was more listening and less preaching by the uninitiated, then maybe there'd be some learning.
 
jtrain609 said:
I'm not going to back Todd up on anything, ever.

But you can't tell me you haven't beat your head into a wall trying to explain safety systems to people here, and wondered why they wouldn't just listen to what you're trying to say instead of trying to be intentionally difficult.

I think that's the point, if there was more listening and less preaching by the uninitiated, then maybe there'd be some learning.
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I hear you.
 
PhilosopherPilot said:
So instead of just dropping one-liners, why don't you point out where my comprehension was lacking?
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:rolleyes:

It isn't that hard.


Yes, the cargo cutout needs to be fixed and then there needs to be some tweaks that need to be made.
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In post 48 I said the above.


PhilosopherPilot said:
Are you seriously saying that FAR 117 is perfect? Beyond reproach? Hold it folks! FAR 117 has reached the pinnacle of policy making and is perfect!
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But you don't mention that with your arrogance in your response in this post and accuse me of saying something it wasn't.
 
Seggy said:
:rolleyes:

It isn't that hard.




In post 48 I said the above.




But you don't mention that with your arrogance in your response in this post and accuse me of saying something it wasn't.
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hy·per·bo·le
hīˈpərbəlē/
noun
exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally.

You just seem to come across that way, so I exaggerated a bit.

Anyway, I read that post you quoted above, but that isn't really relevant to SteveC's assertion that policy based on science doesn't necessarily correlate to it's quality.

I just have to accept that you simply do not get conceptual discussions. You just aren't built that way.
 
BobDDuck said:
segregation-drinking-fountain-400x300.jpg


Because shutting up and just doing things the way they've always been done is a good solution?
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There really isn't a correlation between these two things. Your example is a little extreme. I only came to this country in 1992, but I can't believe signs like that existed only several decades earlier from when I came. What an insult. Personally, if I was a black guy, I'd leave a giant piece of turd in the white drinking fountain. Then I'd see if any white person would rather drink from the colored fountain or continue in their thirst. My mini social experiment.
 
dasleben said:
Didn't you sign up to fly under the old rules, too? What makes you get the rule changes, and not us? Also, you're aware that many passenger flights are flown on the backside of the clock each night too, right?

But I get it... Since I have freight in the back vs. people, I can fly this leg without a rest facility, and it's okay? 11.5 hours, and much of it done in the daytime (leading up to a fun 0200L landing). By the way, you're only looking at domestic freight schedules, which is only the tip of the iceberg of the freight that's actually flown around the world. What you see, and what you're referring to in your post, is merely the end of the assembly line.

map
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You are right, I did. But I didn't ask for the rules to be changed. That had something to do with a Colgan BUF crash. And of course I'm aware many pax flights are done on the back side, I routinely do transcon redeyes west-to-east. I worked at Evergreen as an intern and I did get to see their 747s. The crew rest area seemed rather nice. I don't know what Atlas does but I imagine it's similar. I dunno, I just think by definition freight means you are going to be flying on the back side of the clock even internationally your body clock will be on the back side. It works both ways. The Asiana crew was landing at about 11:30am which was right in the middle of their WOCL in Seoul time. You can't fix it all, but 117 isn't really for the cargo world because it would be really far too restrictive. Somebody has to fly from ICN to SYD. If under the current rules you can't do it safely, then call out sick. But Fedex, UPS, Flying Tigers, ABX, DHL, and a host of other cargo companies have operated under regular 121 rest rules for decades just fine.

On my side, I haven't seen much changes in 117 versus 121 scheduling but maybe that's because I mostly do one-leg transcons and they are legal either way.
 
Cherokee_Cruiser said:
As for the cargo cut-out, no offense, but you did know it was an all-nighter job when you signed up? It's like that NTSB grilling one of the UPS head honchos. Something along the lines of "Can you explain why your flight schedule seems to be majority at night back of the clock?" Answer was along the line of "Well, as you see our business model, we do a lot of next day delivery guarantees. That requires packages be collected at night and brought to a sorting hub, after the sort they are then flown to their final destination in the early morning hours so the package can be delivered that day."

What can you possibly hope for all night flying? There is no physical way to fix back-side of the clock flying. Humans were designed to work at day time and sleep at night. We evolved with better vision at day versus night (rod/cones balance). We are "meant" to sleep at night. To those fatigued pilots at UPS, I'm sorry you fly the backside of the cock. But at least your pay is high enough to offset that inconvenience. As for the BHM crash, lets not blame the lack of FAR 117 as if FAR 117 would have stopped that crash? My advice to any pilot approaching 60 who is complaining about constantly being fatigued is to just pull the trigger and retire. Nothing is stopping you and you'll actually extend your lifespan by getting proper rest and not working anymore at that phase in life.
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Incidentally, regarding UPS: It was my understanding that they would have been legal even under Part 117, as they had their two hour nap.

Everyone likes to confuse safety with legality. They're not the same thing. They're nowhere near the same thing. You can have an operation that's perfectly safe and completely illegal, and you can have a perfectly compliant operation that is ridiculously unsafe. The bottom line under 121Q (etc.) and 117 are still the same: if you think you're fatigued you don't go. (I'm not even close to 60, but I've got no problem calling in fatigued when the situation demands it.)

ATN_Pilot said:
Of course they can be questioned....by people who are qualified to do so. That ain't you. Opinions of laymen are irrelevant in a system based on science. And if we look in this thread, we can see what most of the "opinions" revolve around: "efficiency" and how people like their schedules for pay and day off purposes; not safety.
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Ah yes, the minimum days off for minimum monthly guarantee discussion that never ends. Of course, you can also be frighteningly efficient under Part 117. @Screaming_Emu has flown 35+ hours in 7 days which was impossible under the old world order. A failure to adapt to the regulatory landscape is...unfortunate.
 
Seggy said:
Are you going to do that before or after you accept the fact that I don't give a damn about your opinion?
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That wasn't an insult, just an observation. Some people are built that way and others aren't. My father is NOT built for a discussion on concepts, but he's still a smart guy with a PhD.
 
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