Fatigue scientists resist flight crew schedulers’ demand for go/no-go modeling tools as U.S. airlines brace for sweeping new regulations.
By Wayne Rosenkrans
Airline representatives, fatigue researchers and aviation regulators expect significant near-term progress in reducing the risk of degraded pilot alertness through better application of fatigue theory to flight operations. Some attendees at a recent U.S. symposium, however, criticized government and industry slowness to adopt change. Other specialists expressed confidence that a confluence of cultural changes is now catching up to fatigue science, improving prospects for flexible regulatory oversight and safety enhancement.
The symposium, organized by the MITRE Corp. in cooperation with Flight Safety Foundation and titled “Aviation Fatigue: Building a Bridge Between Research and Operational Needs,” was held June 6–8 in McLean, Virginia, U.S., to fo…
