US Airways Flights To Brazil Begin December 2, 2009

[FA Mikey]

AA, DAL, and UAL all have short layovers in GIG, GRU, SCL, and EZE. The FA's groan about it, yet all of the people bidding and holding it are senior to God.

 

[PHL]

With just under 12 hours, that doesn't seem like enough to be legal.

Let's assume it is though...

What if...the only crew in GIG is the one that just arrived, does that mean the GIG-CLT passengers will be screwed if the aircraft comes in late from CLT (Weather, maint., etc.) because now the inbound crew needs the rest period before the equipment (and same crew) can go back?

 

[Travelpro72]

International flying of that distance has a minimum rest of 16 hours. I don't see how the company could get around that.

 

[flybynite]

Our contract language is different from the other carriers. So it's hard to compare.

And if I'm not mistaken, AA reduced their rest requirements in their last contract. I'm pretty sure they did at least on Dom.

 

[nycbusdriver]

I believe the rest requirements for RIO will have to fall under the current transatlantic minimum. I don't believe they will be able to go any shorter. Not a doubt in my mind that the company will try Lord knows. It's still over a body of water and a hell of a long flight. I don't think 12 hours will satisfy the FAA minimum rest.

Taken in context, your statement about the Rio flight being "over a body of water" is incorrect. Of course, probably 99 percent of our domestic flights fly "over a body of water" at some point.

Get a world map and a ruler. The Rio flight is NOT transoceanic. While it will be over the Atlantic for about the same amount of time as a flight from CLT to Montego Bay, Jamaica, it is over the Atlantic less time than the CLT to San Juan flights,

"International" does not mean "transoceanic," even when different continents are involved.

But it truly is a long flight, a large portion of which is over the Amazon jungle. Since there is no place to land in the Amazon, it is SIMILAR to transoceanic in that sense. And it is being treated that way by the company.

 

[flybynite]

What Travelpro is referring to is our contract language for a flight of this nature which is a little different. He/she wasn't being literal in the sense that this would be an extended overwater operation.

Make sense?

 

[Travelpro72]

I'm just shaking my head. The flight will fall under the language ALREADY in our contract for flights of such length. My GOODNESS. Any OTHER flight that ISN'T "transoceanic" that long? 🙄

 

[flybynite]

Well...the language is pretty good. It's one of those things we clung to like pitbulls in that last debacle contract renegotiation. It was one of those "hell no!" items that we wouldn't forgo. Thank god for that.

 

[phasersonstun2]

I believe the rest requirements for RIO will have to fall under the current transatlantic minimum. I don't believe they will be able to go any shorter. Not a doubt in my mind that the company will try Lord knows. It's still over a body of water and a hell of a long flight. I don't think 12 hours will satisfy the FAA minimum rest.

Trip will be a 26 hr. overnight..

 

[HottootrotNyc]

At CO we don't fly RIO out of EWR anymore but we do fly GRU which is right next door. It is by far our second or third most senior trip. It's a solid 20 hour, Int'l paid 2day, and the best part about is we can piggy back those trips. A lot of people commute in the night of the trip, it departs around midnight and gets to GRU in the early AM. They have day rest and then work the flight back that night and arrive around 6am. So most people take advantage of that and go to there crash paid and get quite a bit of rest and fly back out that night to GRU. I have a friend who flys 6-8 of those a month and gets them done in 10 days or less and have a BAGGIN! PAY CHECK!

If you guys are about the money and not the layover, you want the layover to be short! I'm a money man, I'll see RIO on my own time...

 

[jimntx]

Our contract language is different from the other carriers. So it's hard to compare.

And if I'm not mistaken, AA reduced their rest requirements in their last contract. I'm pretty sure they did at least on Dom.

Well, technically, it wasn't in the last contract which was approved on 9/12/2001 (how's that for irony?). The reduced rest was inserted during the concessions negotiations in 2003. But, yes the domestic rest requirement was reduced. Since then there has been an LOA between the union and the company that we get "8 hours behind the door", and the company has been pretty good about it so far. The last couple of times that I had a lengthy delay which got us to the hotel late, scheduling had already modified our next day departure time to give us the minimum rest.

As I won't live long enough to proffer for International at AA, I don't know about their rest requirements.
But, from what I hear from our International f/as, they think like hottootrotnyc. For the most part unless it's a really lovely city like London, Paris, or Buenos Aires, they want the minimum amount of layover time they can get.