Originally Posted by
subject2load
Really .....???
How many crew do you actually know - and from which airline (s) ....??
I ask because, from my own time spent living & working in the Gulf, this seems very much at odds with the views of the majority of crew I came into contact with. Their general objective was to maximise earnings through overseas/meal allowances on long blocks.
Maybe I'm out of date. Would be interested in any perspective that could be offered by someone with in-depth EK knowledge such as eternaltransit.
No, you're right - EK418 is a highly coveted roster position, especially if one is main fleet: it's one of the only opportunities that someone who can only operate 777 (e.g. main fleet cabin crew, i.e. non-A380 or 777 pilots) can get to go to BKK or Australia. That combined with all the $$$ from the duty time and the fact BKK and SYD are great destinations with two (!) layovers on *each* city on the roster make it a flight where all the crew are generally in good spirits. It only gets ruined if you have a tyrannical Purser! (The flight crew have different rest scheduling so the cabin crew are the ones who stick together for the whole 9 days).
As well as this, the day flight is ex-DXB (so no waking up at silly o'clock to go to work), so you get an evening in BKK, as well as morning and afternoon in BKK the day after - you only have to operate an evening service then everyone sleeps (so you don't have to sleep much in your BKK layover). You arrive into SYD in the morning, so you get to have a morning nap then the whole day in SYD. Then the day after you wake up and go to CHC for during the day for a turnaround. Then you get another day in SYD and operate an evening flight back to BKK which gets in at 0100ish). You get *another* full day in BKK then operate a flight at 0225 where everyone is asleep again.
Pretty much perfect timings all around for crew and layover planning which we all know is the most important part of their lives
