703 duty rest
Moderators: sky's the limit, sepia, Sulako, lilfssister, North Shore, I WAS Birddog
703 duty rest
For us 703 guys, what is your take on duty time rest requirements for crew members on call. For example, if your duty day starts at 6am (on medevac for example) and you fly until 11am. At 9:30pm you get paged out again and are assumed good for another 14hrs. Is this legal?? Ive looked thru the CARs and havent found anything specific. The problem I have with this is that if I started my day at 6am technically, if I HAVENT been released from duty my duty day SHOULD end at 7:45pm. BUT here is the catch Im sure all you medevac drivers hate:
When you return to base your company doesnt say that you are still on duty but neither do they say that you are released. I saw somewhere, but can no longer find, that the company is LEGALLY required to inform the pilot that he HAS or HAS NOT been released. Company is of the opinion is that once back at base you are assumed to be starting your rest but the company reserves the right to interupt your rest. If no calls come within the minimum legal rest period then any call after that period and you are good to go for another 14hours.
Does anyone have opinions on this or links to the regs on this???
When you return to base your company doesnt say that you are still on duty but neither do they say that you are released. I saw somewhere, but can no longer find, that the company is LEGALLY required to inform the pilot that he HAS or HAS NOT been released. Company is of the opinion is that once back at base you are assumed to be starting your rest but the company reserves the right to interupt your rest. If no calls come within the minimum legal rest period then any call after that period and you are good to go for another 14hours.
Does anyone have opinions on this or links to the regs on this???
Keep flying till the noise stops.
703 is so full of holes regarding crew duty days and rest periods...you'd be better off making excuses to your boss about being late or taking time off.
ie: car broke down. You stoped a robbery. You were accepting the Order of Canada that afternoon.
The more passenger seats...the more crew rest. I guess if only 2 people died in a terrible horrific accident because the pilot was fatigued wont make the evening news as say...345 jumping out of an A340 at the end of RWY24 in YYZ because it caught on fire.
ie: car broke down. You stoped a robbery. You were accepting the Order of Canada that afternoon.
The more passenger seats...the more crew rest. I guess if only 2 people died in a terrible horrific accident because the pilot was fatigued wont make the evening news as say...345 jumping out of an A340 at the end of RWY24 in YYZ because it caught on fire.
When I flew air ambulance I went to transport over this also.
There is a CAR about where the employer must inform you of your time free from duty, but our boss said that only meant the company had to tell us when our days off were scheduled, not our work hours within our work days.
Unfortunately Transport was no help at all. They said the CAR's weren't meant to be interpreted the way my boss did, but that they were sufficiently vague that transport was unwilling/unable to do anything about it.
Suppose you get paged out and fly for 4 hours. You go home, and if you don't get paged out for another 10 hours, then your duty day has reset (our duty rest period was 10 hours according to our company ops, yours may vary). If you get paged out again, then you continue your duty day from the orignal pageout.
If you work 10 hours, then there is a period where they can't page you: For example, 5 hours after that, your 15 hour day would be up, but you would only be 5 hours into your duty rest, so they couldn't page you until your duty rest period was up. It's a very, very small comfort, but it was the only thing we had so we tried to look on the bright side.
There is a CAR about where the employer must inform you of your time free from duty, but our boss said that only meant the company had to tell us when our days off were scheduled, not our work hours within our work days.
Unfortunately Transport was no help at all. They said the CAR's weren't meant to be interpreted the way my boss did, but that they were sufficiently vague that transport was unwilling/unable to do anything about it.
Suppose you get paged out and fly for 4 hours. You go home, and if you don't get paged out for another 10 hours, then your duty day has reset (our duty rest period was 10 hours according to our company ops, yours may vary). If you get paged out again, then you continue your duty day from the orignal pageout.
If you work 10 hours, then there is a period where they can't page you: For example, 5 hours after that, your 15 hour day would be up, but you would only be 5 hours into your duty rest, so they couldn't page you until your duty rest period was up. It's a very, very small comfort, but it was the only thing we had so we tried to look on the bright side.
Last edited by Sulako on Mon Sep 26, 2005 8:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
So basically what you are saying is that when you are at home you have to be in bed resting. Yeah sure. Everybody's body works like that. Any company that runs like that and screws up your sleep pattern is asking of an accident then loves to blame the pilot. Remeber the CARS DO say a pilot is not to fly fatigued......PERIOD. Use that one.
It's simple. When you get back from flying, rather than going home, hang out at the office and wash the airplane, or the boss's truck or something. You'll be damn sure they let you know when you're off duty when you're always around !!
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"You can bomb the world to pieces, but you can't bomb it into peace!" Michael Franti- Spearhead
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"You can bomb the world to pieces, but you can't bomb it into peace!" Michael Franti- Spearhead
"Trust everyone, but cut the cards". My Grandma.
- BirdDog IV
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AIRTIDS:
We HAD to clean the acft each time we returned from a Medivac, interior and exterior when we put it back in the hangar.
In the winter, during day-ops, we would get in the plow and clear around the hagar, our small ramp, and the front parking lot, (This was in North Western Alberta)!!!
All of this DURING our "duty day".... so much for resting.
As soon as you get all this done...you could count on another dispatch.
Best thing Medivac Crews can do is as a group, meet with your Ops Mgr or C/P or Owner and come up with alternatives to late duty-days;
ie. If duty day is from 0600 until 1800, a late dispatch ( 1700hrs) should be taken by the night shift, and Days will reset with them earlier the next day...(take a dispatch after 0500hrs)...it worked for us.
We HAD to clean the acft each time we returned from a Medivac, interior and exterior when we put it back in the hangar.
In the winter, during day-ops, we would get in the plow and clear around the hagar, our small ramp, and the front parking lot, (This was in North Western Alberta)!!!
All of this DURING our "duty day".... so much for resting.
As soon as you get all this done...you could count on another dispatch.
Best thing Medivac Crews can do is as a group, meet with your Ops Mgr or C/P or Owner and come up with alternatives to late duty-days;
ie. If duty day is from 0600 until 1800, a late dispatch ( 1700hrs) should be taken by the night shift, and Days will reset with them earlier the next day...(take a dispatch after 0500hrs)...it worked for us.
I often questioned this in my days in 703. I worked for a company where I was the ONLY Captain on the a/c for about a year. So that meant I was on call 24/7 365 for a little over a year. Legal? No f**kin' way! On at least 2 occasions that I can remember we had what amounted to a 30 hour duty day that they somehow figured was "split" because they got us a room for 3 hours. The FO and I would have to arrange with the dispatcher to lie to any calls that came in if we wanted to go out and have a night with the boys (of course the president had no idea this was happening).
I wouldn't expect ANY help from TC until we have a couple of accidents involving guys that fall within this situation of a 'misinterpreted' duty shift. They're great at REACTING rather than being PROActive. And guess what SplitS? The sad thing is, with the state of aviation in Canada as it is today, if you raise too much of a stink and get fired, there's about a 100 guys ready to JUMP at the chance to take your job. Even some that would do it for free.
So hang in there and hopefully a/c will pick up the phone and give you a steady schedule. Then you can start the long recovery process of not jumping every time the phone rings, or you hear a beep that sounds like your pager. It took me a little over a year; and to this day I still feel my heart skip a beet when I hear the sound of my old pager somewhere on the street.
I wouldn't expect ANY help from TC until we have a couple of accidents involving guys that fall within this situation of a 'misinterpreted' duty shift. They're great at REACTING rather than being PROActive. And guess what SplitS? The sad thing is, with the state of aviation in Canada as it is today, if you raise too much of a stink and get fired, there's about a 100 guys ready to JUMP at the chance to take your job. Even some that would do it for free.
So hang in there and hopefully a/c will pick up the phone and give you a steady schedule. Then you can start the long recovery process of not jumping every time the phone rings, or you hear a beep that sounds like your pager. It took me a little over a year; and to this day I still feel my heart skip a beet when I hear the sound of my old pager somewhere on the street.
CCncoke,
Amen, but those clowns at AC havent called - yet. My pager still scares the hell out of me too.
I posted this b/c I thought that what TC allows is bullshit and although I work for a good company (not "blunder" air or god forbid - Air Bravo) I still think it stinks. It very rarely happens that we get caught in this situation but I laugh at the thought of using the "fatigue" excuse. That would get a guy a permanent vacation.
HEY AC -call me already!!
Amen, but those clowns at AC havent called - yet. My pager still scares the hell out of me too.
I posted this b/c I thought that what TC allows is bullshit and although I work for a good company (not "blunder" air or god forbid - Air Bravo) I still think it stinks. It very rarely happens that we get caught in this situation but I laugh at the thought of using the "fatigue" excuse. That would get a guy a permanent vacation.
HEY AC -call me already!!
Keep flying till the noise stops.
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CARS 700.16 states a duty day can not exceed 14 hours in any 24 consecutive hours, therefore no matter how many hours off you get once your day has started you can't exceed 14 hours unless you extend with rest or for unforseen circumstanses.... and in both those cases the max is to 17 hours a duty day can't be reset with 8 hours rest only with the expiration of your 24th consecutive hour......
The answer lies in the CASS at 720.21.1 in that your rest period commencement can not shift by more than 3 hours from your previous rest period or more than 8 hours in any 7 consecutive days. So if your previos rest preiod was from 20:00 to 06:00 your next rest period could not commence until 17:00 to 03:00. Clear as mud.
Forget the interpretation. The bottom line is that if you feel tired (fatigued) you not only have a right, but an obligation not to report for duty. I have done it on a couple of occasions, and if a company can't deal with that occasionaly, then start looking for another job.
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You bolded the wrong part. You also omitted a word. 700.16 states a duty day cannot exceed 14 consecutive hours in any 24 consecutive hours.Navajo Chief wrote:CARS 700.16 states a duty day can not exceed 14 hours in any 24 consecutive hours, therefore no matter how many hours off you get once your day has started you can't exceed 14 hours unless you extend with rest or for unforseen circumstanses.... and in both those cases the max is to 17 hours a duty day can't be reset with 8 hours rest only with the expiration of your 24th consecutive hour......
So you could work 10 hours rest 8, then work 6 more. 16 total duty hours in 24 consecutive hours, but the 14 duty hours were not consecutive
Clear as mud?
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sorry for the omission, however nowhere in the cars does it say what you're saying. There is nothing that says 8 hours rest re-set's to a new duty day, the only reason the fourteen consecutive hours is there is because it is possible to work more than 14 hours in any one duty day but not consecutively. later parts explain about unforseen circumstances and split day extensions....that is why a split day has a maximum of 3 hours with a 6 hour rest period....any 24 hour period is any 24 hour period. period.
How about this:
Do the rules for "pilots who are on call" apply to those who are on standby or on reserve? Is their such a thing as "on call" or is their only standby (less than one hour) and reserve (more than one hour)? What's the definition of "on call?" I see reserve, and I see standby. But I don't see on call. And if there are rules for "on reserve" how come their are no rules for "on standby?"
Do the rules for "pilots who are on call" apply to those who are on standby or on reserve? Is their such a thing as "on call" or is their only standby (less than one hour) and reserve (more than one hour)? What's the definition of "on call?" I see reserve, and I see standby. But I don't see on call. And if there are rules for "on reserve" how come their are no rules for "on standby?"
I don't understand what you are saying.Navajo Chief wrote:sorry for the omission, however nowhere in the cars does it say what you're saying. There is nothing that says 8 hours rest re-set's to a new duty day, the only reason the fourteen consecutive hours is there is because it is possible to work more than 14 hours in any one duty day but not consecutively. later parts explain about unforseen circumstances and split day extensions....that is why a split day has a maximum of 3 hours with a 6 hour rest period....any 24 hour period is any 24 hour period. period.
8 hours off refers to the minimum rest period b/t flight duty days, so why wouldn't it reset it?
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