“Not sure how women pilots are going to “pee in a cup”. It’s pretty bad when the captain couldn’t get back into the cockpit. Something is really wrong with the set up the way it is.”
I’ve done it, and if one has to do it, the bigger cup, the better. However, if you have to empty your bowels, that would be far more unpleasant for either sex. Maybe Mr. B’s suggestion of astronaut diapers is a better alternative. And actually, if you know pilots, we would do just about anything for more money. So if it came with a big bonus, there wouldn’t be much complaining. However, I would personally stick to flights of three hours or less, and plan on keeping myself dehydrated during the flight. And try to fly with only women whenever possible.
I don’t know how you solve the problem of depression. People would definitely hide it (and I’m sure many still do), if they thought they would be unemployable.
Hey, isn’t there a low fare carrier in Europe (or two) that actually charges you to use the bathroom? Maybe if everyone wore diapers, they’d solve that problem. Nobody would use it, then they could put in more seats. But the smell…
Boy, talk about having a bad day at work. You know it’s bad when a good day would have been “Honey, I had to use the crash axe to batter down the cockpit door and kill my crazy FO today”
The two person rule in the cockpit has been US standard for years but has not been an European guide line.
It has been immediately adopted by many in the European union starting with Norway in the aftermath of this tragedy. Not a cure all or safeguard against all scenarios. But it will be built on.
As to the most recent reports ( and who knows what the updates will be or reveal), he acted out of depression and was able to with hold his “do not fly status” report from his physician from his employer.
I hate to think of the can of worms this opens for anybody dealing with depression or any other potential problem. Or for employers who try to keep the balance between privacy for employees and protection of their consumers.
Investigators found a ripped up note from a doctor saying that the co-pilot was unfit to fly. The note was found in a wastebasket at the co-pilot’s apartment. They also said that it was NOT depression, but they didn’t say what the illness was.
Could it be that the co-pilot had some sort of terminal illness? Did the diagnosis make him suicidal? Was the terminal illness something like a brain tumor that can also affect a person’s cognition and mental status, so that that person isn’t thinking clearly. I’m trying to come up with a theory that reconciles the reports from friends that he seemed ‘normal’, not a psychopath,etc. with what he did.
Jet pilots should be allowed to get up and occasionaly walk around during a long flight–unless they’re going to start prescribing blood thinners to all of them. The last thing you want to happen to your pilot is for him to throw a blood clot.
My brother suffered from depression for years, but was able to control it with medication. He became a gasoline truck driver. Unfortunately, he began to suffer from delusions and just parked his rig on the side of the road one day, got out and started running, believing people were chasing him. We convinced him to temporarily leave his job and see a doctor. It took about a week for the appointment, where he was diagnosed as manic-depressive (aka bipolar). It seems like a few weeks later, his truck driving license was revoked, so there was a delay. Something similar may have been in the works for this pilot. It is sad.
That egomaniac owner of Ryanair of Ireland proposed pay toilets a few years ago.
And another thing…how did U.S. airlines get away with lowering the pay of pilots in recent years? To hear pilots tell it, the pay these days is awful. Was it not that long ago (the 1990s) that U.S. pilots generally had a great income? The few pilots I knew lived in fairly comfortable neighborhoods. They weren’t rich but they lived pretty good out in the burbs.
Ryanair announced it was contemplating such plan, but I do not think anyone implemented one. This is the kind of policy that might please Spirit in the US. A good business plan: offer free refills on beer and sparkling water but charge for the use of the toilet!
“And another thing…how did U.S. airlines get away with lowering the pay of pilots in recent years? To hear pilots tell it, the pay these days is awful. Was it not that long ago (the 1990s) that U.S. pilots generally had a great income? The few pilots I knew lived in fairly comfortable neighborhoods. They weren’t rich but they lived pretty good out in the burbs”
Here’s how they did it. They declared bankruptcy, and either voided the contracts or got the pilots to renegotiate for a lower salary. They ditched the pension plans, they furloughed pilots, and they grounded airplanes. The lower progression rate due to the age limit being raised from 60 to 65 along with less airplanes and the recession, cut salaries even further by forcing people to move from higher paying positions to lower paying ones(Captain to First Officer, wide body to narrow body). However, most of them still managed to pay out great management bonuses for their outstanding cost cutting measures, isn’t that a relief? The theory was that they needed to retain that excellent talent that got the airline into bankruptcy. Bankruptcy was used as a competitive tool to ditch their costs, not because it was necessary. And the system we have in the US just lets these bankrupt carriers go on forever.
However, the pay at major carriers has never been awful, but many people got their incomes slashed by over 50%, and even now that the carriers are profitable and the pay is going up significantly, it is not equal to what it would have been if it had just kept up with inflation. A captain should be making approximately 450K now, in comparison to what they made in the 70’s, is a number that I heard. Don’t know how accurate that is, but it sounds reasonable. There have been people furloughed for over ten years, and pay at the regionals is still abysmal. .
“Some would argue that if they don’t like their pay and working conditions those people should just go get another job”
That sounds easy enough, doesn’t it? However, this is seniority based union business. You could have 30 years of flying experience, and if you go out and get another flying job (if you are even able to), you start at the bottom, making 20-30K the first year. People are tied to their airline, there aren’t that many of them to get employment with, so that is why when companies start playing hardball with negotiations and doing their best to slash salaries and benefits, people stay and fight. It is very rare for people to switch carriers, as even if you do, you never know when that one is going to furlough you and slash pay. I know people that have been furloughed four times, and it’s not like a gentle government furlough, where you don’t go to work for a couple of weeks and then still get paid, it’s for years, with zero pay and benefits. Sometimes you never get recalled.
Some people have completely gotten out of aviation after a furlough, but for many pilots it’s a passion, it’s what their skill is and they don’t want to do something completely different. They stick it out, through the good and bad times.
However, if you have to empty your bowels, that would be far more unpleasant for either sex. Maybe Mr. B’s suggestion of astronaut diapers is a better alternative. And actually, if you know pilots, we would do just about anything for more money. So if it came with a big bonus, there wouldn’t be much complaining. However, I would personally stick to flights of three hours or less, and plan on keeping myself dehydrated during the flight. And try to fly with only women whenever possible.