Congress Mandated The Release Of Rules By August 1st

The Coalition of Airline Pilots Associations (CAPA), representing over 28,000 commercial passenger and cargo pilots, is calling on the FAA to release the new Flight/Duty Time regulations addressing airline pilot fatigue as required by the Airline Safety and Federal Aviation Extension Act of 2010. Congress, in H.R. 5900, called for new, scientifically-based limitations on the hours of flight and duty time for pilots in order to address fatigue.  Furthermore, Congress mandated those rules be released no later than August 1, 2011.  That deadline has passed while the rule is being analyzed at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

“The concern is that the scientifically based set of flight time/duty time regulations addressing pilot fatigue is now at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and faces a possible rewrite due to overstated airline management cost concerns and not scientific facts regarding human fatigue,” comments Captain Carl Kuwitzky, President of CAPA.
 
CAPA and the FAA each agree in providing comprehensive solutions to regulatory reforms, and have long advocated “One Level of Safety” for all commercial flight operations: both passenger and all-cargo.  Tremendous steps forward were made in the proposed rules such as “One Level Safety” and strongly defined pilot rest requirements.  For more than 25 years the NTSB has called for meaningful reform of these regulations to no avail, but now they are within reach. The associations say it is "vitally important to the safety of our nation’s aviation transportation system" that these new rules be implemented without further delay.

The Coalition of Airline Pilots Associations is a Trade Association includes pilots for American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, UPS Airlines, US Airways, Southern Air, ABX Air, Atlas Air Cargo, Kalitta Air, Polar Air Cargo, Arrow Air, and Horizon Air, Miami Air, USA 3000, Omni Air, Gulfstream Air.

FMI: www.capapilots.org