Rest Rules Could Create Pilot Shortage?

(From a recent AVweb news article)

American Airlines says proposed rules intended to reduce pilot fatigue would require it to hire an additional 2,325 pilots at a cost of $514 million annually, and seemed to suggest the industry-wide effect could be crippling. The rules would effectively decrease maximum time on duty for pilots. In November, American offered public comments on the rules, saying "if AA needs 2,300 more pilots to meet the proposed rules, other certificate holders will need many additional pilots, too." Stakeholders also claim that the regulation's cost will be substantially higher than the FAA's estimate of $1.25 billion over 10 years. 

The Air Transport Association says the rule would cost more than 15 times that figure. As for the total number of pilots needed to meet the requirements of the bill, American said, "The industry figure will be so large as to raise the question of from where they all will come." American wasn't the only carrier to express concern.

Southwest commented on the proposal, saying "we feel than many of the rule changes will impact our operation as dramatically, if not more so, than the impact on any other carrier." The proposed rules call for nine hours rest between shifts and 30 consecutive hours away from work, each week. The proposal arose with support of people who lost family members in the crash of Continental Connection Flight 3407. There were no survivors of that flight, so the exact role of fatigue is unknown. However, the investigation found that neither member of the cockpit crew had slept in a bed the night before the crash, both had long commutes, and fatigue may have affected crew performance. In February 2010, NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman called the crash "an opportunity to reexamine fatigue in aviation."

Fatigue in aviation has been on the NTSB's Most Wanted List of Transportation Safety Improvements since 1990. The FAA accepted comments on the proposed rules (PDF) through Nov. 15, 2010.

My comments:

Reduced safety due to short crew rest periods and long duty hours has been a major concern especially after the crash of Colgan Air Flight 3407 that killed all on board.  Crew rest was cited as a possible contributing factor as neither flight crew member had what many would consider to be adequate sleep prior to the flight.  

What I hear in this news story is an airline industry unwilling to make small changes to ensure the public receive safe air transportation.  I understand that decreasing the length of time a pilot is allowed to remain on duty, while also increasing crew sleep periods will require an added expense to the airlines, but no airline is being singled out to carry this burden. Rather, the ruling would affect the entire airline industry and the cost would  be passed down to the consumer.

While the airline industry at first, and later consumer advocacy groups may balk at an increase in cost, the public outrage that was voiced immediately after the Colgan crash over the extreme personal loss following a zero survival crash, should be enough to remind us that the consequences of industrywide pilot fatigue are far to great to warrant complaints over a small increases in ticket prices.  

Finally, the airline industry is expressing concern over an inadequate supply of pilots to support a change like this.  In fact, there is likely to be a significant pilot supply issue over the next 10 years.  Here are the numbers, airline industry experts expect airline passenger traffic to double by 2020, mainline carriers are expected to need to train 17,000 pilots a year between now and 2020 - roughly 3500 more per year than we are currently training to fill seats vacated by retiring boomers, as well as the pilot seats of roughly 16,000 aircraft on order through 2020. 

The problem is, it's hard to attract smart college graduates to the airline industry when entry level pay into a regional airline remains somewhere between $20,000 and $25,000 per year, especially when most airlines are willing to publicly balk at the idea of increasing pilot quality of life by increasing rest periods and reducing duty duration to a level that doesn't cause regular and often life threatening pilot fatigue.