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Flying slow to save fuel?

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dickburns

dickburns

Well-known member
Joined
May 23, 2006
Posts
265
What's up with some of the regionals flying slow to save fuel these days? Do they NOT want to get to the destination asap? A CHQ was doing 250 over the ground at FL300 the other day on his way to IAD, and had his speed pulled back to "conserve fuel" wtf, is this a company directive?
 
what do you care? why the hell would you want to go fast to make your sit last longer? you get paid when the plane is moving. if you're showing early, why not pull it back? you get in on time, save a buck or two on fuel. the pax don't know any different, and the codeshare gets a lower bill on fuel, and your paycheck goes up. win for everyone.
 
dickburns said:
What's up with some of the regionals flying slow to save fuel these days? Do they NOT want to get to the destination asap? A CHQ was doing 250 over the ground at FL300 the other day on his way to IAD, and had his speed pulled back to "conserve fuel" wtf, is this a company directive?
Click to expand...

Airlines operate MUCH differently than 91 or 135 operators. For them the priority is GET THERE NOW, for the airlines every gallon of fuel you save at $2.25/gal while still arriving on time makes a huge difference when operating on that scale.

I pull back the thrust if we've got a big tailwind and/or if we're so early we'd have to wait for a gate. Passengers don't know the difference between 335 and 250 but they sure as hell know the difference between flying and sitting on the ramp.

Seems many regionals' cruise profile is .74/300kt for fuel conservation, while legacies are up around .77 and SWA is at MMO.
 
Its a damn small world, I gotta say. I was in the aircraft doing 250 indicated from YOW to IAD. We were on schedule to be 35 minutes early do to the overblocking. I heard you guys behing us, and in case you didn't notice we said we could do any speed they needed to accomodate other traffic. Believe me, I'd rather always go faster back to the hub since there's a tremendous amount on traffic all doing as filed speed, but the captain I was flying with didn't really seem to care about that.
 
Its pretty easy to save 200-300lbs of fuel by flying a little slower, even on shorter flight that are less than an hour. Think about it, 300lbs = roughly 45 gallons. Thats $100 just on that one flight. Multiply that by thousands of flights each day. Thats a lot of saved oil, money, and not to mention less pollution.
 
At CMR we have a poor man's approach to cost-index flying. The majors can just plug a cost index number into the FMS and the autothrottles take care of the rest.

We use a book that selects the optimum speed based on weight, altitude and headwinds. In a lot of cases, we're cruising at 250 or 260 knots indicated.

when it first rolled out, we made a lot of extra money because we were 15-20 late everywhere. they've now built the speeds into the block times, so you still get there on time. When you think about it, flying slow doesn't add that much time to a leg and it does save some gas.
 
I'm an XJT Captain and if we're early I will absolutely pull the speed back a little to save gas and avoid getting to the gate too early. Instead of doing .78 I'll do .74 or so...Saves about 100lbs/side/hr.

And common, really what's the difference between .78 and .74?? Maybe 25kts? The difference between 450kts and 425kts is 2-3 minutes on a 90 minute flight.
 
dickburns said:
What's up with some of the regionals flying slow to save fuel these days? Do they NOT want to get to the destination asap? A CHQ was doing 250 over the ground at FL300 the other day on his way to IAD, and had his speed pulled back to "conserve fuel" wtf, is this a company directive?
Click to expand...

Flying slow may not be direct company directive, however a great emphasis on fuel conservation is happening in the industry. Especially at the regional level, where we have to compete for the contracts for the "major" flying. If "we" can reduce our costs then maybe we will see more flying from the major partner. Behind labor, fuel is the second highest expense for an airline. If an airline does NOT have a fuel conservation program in place in todays market then it is only harming the company, the employees, and the customers.

At my company we have a fuel conservation program in place that directs us to fly certain profiles when able (some airports are too congested) and as a professional, fuel conservation is certainally part of my decision making process as I manage the overall flight.

No, the goal is not to get to the destination ASAP. That is a myth. The goal in 121 (majors as well as the regionals) is to get there on schedule within the block times, and hopefully have saved some fuel. If you close the doors early, have a short taxi, have a tailwind, and no ATC delays you might be early to your destination according to your block time. At most companies the block times for every flight segment are based on historical block times.

As stated in above posts, if you arrive at your destination 30-20 minutes early and have to sit on the ground awaiting your gate to open up you will DEFINITELY here it from your passengers, even if you get to the gate early or "on time" based on your scheduled arrival time.

However, by flying 250 if ATC permits, it will not only save fuel, a big concern at the 121 level since crude is above $90 a barrel right now, but you will arrive maybe 10 minutes early, your gate is open, the passengers aren't the wiser, and maybe you have made an extra couple of minutes of pay on that leg.

Also, as stated above, we are paid on block times if you leave early then you are only screwing yourselves in pay if you fly as fast as you can.
You are also screwing your fellow pilots by reducing the historical block time on a particular leg. That will be looked at to compute future block/credit times for the leg.

Fuel management is why we taxi out on one engine and as we get close to the runway start the other, and also why we don't start the APU (sometimes!) until close to the departure time. Every little bit helps, especially in this industry and economy!
 
Gandalf said:
Flying slow may not be direct company directive, however a great emphasis on fuel conservation is happening in the industry. Especially at the regional level, where we have to compete for the contracts for the "major" flying. If "we" can reduce our costs then maybe we will see more flying from the major partner. Behind labor, fuel is the second highest expense for an airline. If an airline does NOT have a fuel conservation program in place in todays market then it is only harming the company, the employees, and the customers.

At my company we have a fuel conservation program in place that directs us to fly certain profiles when able (some airports are too congested) and as a professional, fuel conservation is certainally part of my decision making process as I manage the overall flight.

No, the goal is not to get to the destination ASAP. That is a myth. The goal in 121 (majors as well as the regionals) is to get there on schedule within the block times, and hopefully have saved some fuel. If you close the doors early, have a short taxi, have a tailwind, and no ATC delays you might be early to your destination according to your block time. At most companies the block times for every flight segment are based on historical block times.

As stated in above posts, if you arrive at your destination 30-20 minutes early and have to sit on the ground awaiting your gate to open up you will DEFINITELY here it from your passengers, even if you get to the gate early or "on time" based on your scheduled arrival time.

However, by flying 250 if ATC permits, it will not only save fuel, a big concern at the 121 level since crude is above $90 a barrel right now, but you will arrive maybe 10 minutes early, your gate is open, the passengers aren't the wiser, and maybe you have made an extra couple of minutes of pay on that leg.

Also, as stated above, we are paid on block times if you leave early then you are only screwing yourselves in pay if you fly as fast as you can.
You are also screwing your fellow pilots by reducing the historical block time on a particular leg. That will be looked at to compute future block/credit times for the leg.

Fuel management is why we taxi out on one engine and as we get close to the runway start the other, and also why we don't start the APU (sometimes!) until close to the departure time. Every little bit helps, especially in this industry and economy!
Click to expand...





Actually fuel is a higher expense than labor at most if not all airlines these days(labor has taken pay cuts or not recieved COLA, fuel has just gone up year after year)!
 
Fly slow, save the company money so they can cut your pay. Makes sense.
 
I certainly understand wanting to save fuel, and I'll do the same thing when possible, but if you know traffic is behind you and having to slow down for you, then pick your dang speed up to normal. Flying 250 indicated on busy airways on the east coast is going to hold up people behind you that maybe aren't going to be early like you are. Sure, save fuel when you can, but don't hold everybody else up.
 
DX Rick said:
Fly slow, save the company money so they can cut your pay. Makes sense.
Click to expand...

At my company it doesn't matter what speed we fly at, management can do what it wants with our pay and we have no control, say, or ability to change it even if we wanted to.

So, fly slower if able and yes PCL, not all the time in congested airspace where you are going to be a burden to others...

But, I'm going to try to fly slower when able and add a couple extra $$ to my paycheck....
 
Last edited:
yup just like everyone else said, more money in your pocket, saves the company money, and you dont have to sit on the ground for 20minutes waiting for a gate to open. but agreed if you are holding someone else up pick it up and get out of the way
 

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