A Boeing 747 cargo freighter belonging to Atlas Air.S3studio | Getty PhotographsAs the height vacation season ramps up for on-line retailers and tr
A Boeing 747 cargo freighter belonging to Atlas Air.
S3studio | Getty Photographs
As the height vacation season ramps up for on-line retailers and transport corporations, cargo pilots that fly packages for Amazon, UPS and FedEx are pushing to work below the identical guidelines as passenger pilots, a change that the business says might pose security hazards by abrupt schedule modifications.
However some lawmakers assume in any other case and are backing a single normal.
After lobbying from the package-delivery business, cargo pilots had been excluded from new relaxation necessities for pilots that took impact in 2014. These guidelines required a minimal of 10 hours of relaxation for passenger pilots in between flights. Relaxation necessities for cargo pilots remained at eight hours.
Three Home lawmakers — Reps. John Katko, R-N.Y., Salud Carbajal, D-Calif. and Matt Cartwright, D-Pa.— final week launched the Protected Skies Act that may deliver cargo pilots below the identical guidelines as passenger pilots. The same invoice was reintroduced within the Senate earlier this yr.
A number of unions, together with these representing pilots at UPS and FedEx, are urging lawmakers to make the change.
Some say a change is overdue.
“It is ridiculous that we do not [have the same rest rules for cargo pilots] and the one motive we do not is for financial causes,” stated Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the previous US Airways captain famed for his…