Flight Attendants Fight for 10

Flight Attendants are entrusted with the safety, health, and security of passengers. But they’re often asked to perform duties on their “rest” time, resulting in getting less rest than required.

A top legislative priority for AFA-CWA is increased minimum rest requirements for Flight Attendants to be included in the Federal Aviation Administration’s authorization.

Flight Attendants will “rally for rest” at the U.S. Capitol in Washington DC, on March 16, then lobby members of Congress to get these critical changes included in the FAA reauthorization.   

Seven Flight Attendant fatigue studies, commissioned by Congress, have concluded that the best way to combat fatigue is to get more rest. Current federal regulation “rest” rules provide only 8 hours after a 14-hour day. But that “rest” time includes passenger deplaning, travel to and checking in at a hotel, preparing for the next day, travel back to the airport, transiting security, crew briefing and safety checks, passenger boarding and finally the aircraft release from the gate. This likely means just 4 to 5 hours of sleep before another long day, if everything goes well.

“Flight Attendant rest should equal pilot rest in order to do our work as aviation’s first responders,” AFA-CWA said.  Pilots currently are provided with at least 10 hours of rest between shifts.  AFA-CWA also is calling for a Fatigue Risk Management Plan that will admit Flight Attendant fatigue exists and help identify fatigue-related risks.

Nearly 90,000 Flight Attendants from all carriers would benefit, as would the flying public. Despite record airline industry profits, Flight Attendants are being forced to work to the point of exhaustion because of minimum staffing, delays and inexperienced schedulers.