standaman said:
If it was a company policy then good for them. Who cares wether it makes sense or not in the middle of August.
Are you telling me you'd feel 100% confident looking your 50 passengers in the eye, telling them that you diverted to BFE rather than somewhere reasonably close to their destination, because you couldn't find deicing fluid in the middle of the summer?
If the requirement is true then it exists for the safety of the passengers, aircraft, and crew. You can't just pick and choose what rules are valid today and what will be valid tommorrow. It's all or nothing in my opinion.
Safety? No. The requirement exists because the bureaucrat who wrote the manual didn't think it through, and an illogical rule is in the book. Bring it to the airline's attention (I'm sure this incident will), and it'll get corrected. Don't hide behind safety when you
know that's a crock.
This isn't a question of "picking and choosing" rules. This is a question of using your brain and your background of knowledge to apply them appropriately. Here's an example: When my window heat won't test on an airplane that's parked in the sun, my knowledge and experience tells me that it's because the glass is already above the thermostat cutout temperature. My checklist makes no mention of it -- it simply says to check that it turns on.
By your logic, I should write up and ground the airplane and strand the passengers until a suitably cool piece of $20,000 glass can be located and installed? No. I
use my brain and realize that it isn't a safety issue, just as the lack of Type IV in August isn't.
I swear there should be a day dedicated to logic and reason in every airline's indoc.