Screaming_Emu
Well-Known Member
Honestly, since I’ve moved to the left seat the job has become significantly less stressful because of all of the above.
I haven’t had any huge complications, but being able to decide how the day is going to go instead of politely suggesting that I’m uncomfortable because our procedures say that we will have a completely clean wing before we depart. A lot of stress goes away when you realize that the airplane will (mostly) only end up in a position that you agreed to. There‘s not a whole lot of “adult supervision” at my shop either, so as long as what you want generally sounds like a good idea, you likely won’t see any pushback.
COVID was different because we went to a lot of places where pulling the plug and going to the hotel was either incredibly inconvenient or straight up against the law. But for example a few months ago when the volcanoes in Russia were impacting Anchorage we went from “you probably aren’t going” and constant updates on the hour to “why haven’t you left yet” When there was a shift change in dispatch. I pointed out why i was uncomfortable and was given carte blanche on how much fuel I wanted to carry. My concern was we were going to get near Alaska (which is where our destination and alternate were) and be out of options. Got enough fuel to make it back to White Horse should that happen and then off we went.
