New European rules ‘harmonizing’ the workload limits across 27 member states could allow pilots to fly aircraft for 22 hours without sleep, increasing a pilot’s work day from 16 hours 15 minutes to 20 hours, and the maximum shift time for a long haul flight with two pilots from 12 to 14 hours, as well as eliminating the need of a third pilot on long-haol flights.
The proposals have raised the attention of BALPA, The British Airline Pilots Association.
The seventeen percent increase in workload will result in a 5.5% higher chance of an accident.
It is inconceivable how EASA can call “flying farther with less rest-time, more frequently (7 starts in a row), no back up crew and more fatigue” bringing standards “up” when it is actually leveling down safety standards. Such a workload flies in the face of the constructs of human biology.
But the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) “has said they have no fundamental problem with the rules.”
