A DC-9 crew doing a MMMY-YIP gets to adhere to 2 pilot rules, BUT go to a 727, add an engineer and suddenly now you have 3 international robots who can wait days for freight with no fatigue?
I can't believe the management can't take the high road and create something safer than the barely legal minimum.
Pilotyip, you complain about instant compliance, but we're not asking you to move mountains. (don't worry, thank goodness we have govt mandated GPWS). We're asking you (and all management) to start moving in the right direction of a safety culture that's been cultivated for the past few decades. Instead, we will have a ft/dt rule ignoring fatigue and circadian rhythms that would be a regression in safety.
If tonight at midnight we said put 20 TCAS boxes in all 20 airplanes in a fleet, we'd be unreasonable. You could start doing 1 install a month for the next 20 months. Obviously this is a dated example to make a point. You get the idea. Waiting until the compliance date and then panicking is hazardously lazy.
Would you and others in management take the high road and put GPWS in each aircraft you sent to Mexico if weren't already mandated? Nah, we don't need it, those Mexican controllers are always helpful and speak good English.
Did the company fold up back when previous improvements to safety were implemented? Or did you simply pass it on to the customer. Or did you reduce your margin? Oh, that's right, we forgot, the sky fell.
But using the 24-in-7 and the unlimited duty and 120 in 30, i.e. the bare-bones bargain-basement bottom end of the regulations as the last word in safety is simply ignorant and negligent.
So you force the crew/PIC to play the fatigue card as their only relief, and when they do, chew them out with a nice Monday-morning phone call. And when they don't play that card, conveniently you can blame the PIC for poor judgement, and careless/reckless will take care of it if something ever were to happen. Oh sure, look Mr. POI, we have a fatigue mitigation plan! But you'll be chucking that Captain under the bus quicker than he can answer his pager.
The Airline is safe! AHA! Thank you ITT Tech, this Associate's in basket-weaving management with a minor in muffler shop sure got my career started!
But why change? You've always made money doing it this way. It's like hitting yourself in the head with a hammer, because it feels SO GOOD when you stop.
Think about it this way, yip - if you actually make safety improvements with regard to aircraft utilization and crew schedules, you'll need more pilots and then-
you'll actually have that pilot shortage you've always dreamed of.