Hi all -

I was hoping you could help settle a dispute I've been having with a friend, a pilot and union representative.

Some of his literature partially attributes the success of the major Asian carriers to "appalling working conditions for pilots".

Among other things, it claims that Cathay pilots perform next-day turns at such destinations as Johannesburg, Vancouver and Toronto, sometimes with no reserve crew on board. I find this hard to believe.

Is this true? I have a JNB trip in the works and I assumed that the crew, both flight ops and inflight service, would have more rest on the ground in JNB than one night.

At JNB they get 2 days and have some way to arrange more time off (the captain and co-pilot on my last flight was going golfing). CX has a 3rd pilot on board for all flights over 8 hours duration. I suppose the misinformation that your friend has isn't a big surprise -- CX has had a multi-year disput with their pilots, due to firinging off some a few years ago in the midst of an industrial dispute which is still unresolved best that I can tell. Rather a shame as I think it is really a good company, which tries to make things better, but suffers from a tough competitive position and being in a really (really) tough market. CX is quite different from SQ, for example.
As a point of comparison, AA has 24 hour layovers for trans-Atlantic flights (8 hour sectors). So the crew has a full day off (but no more, and no other allowance for jet lag). I often fly the same schedule to Europe and notice the same captain and cabin crew for my return flight. In that context the CX policy is better than AA's (which is the same for all the major carriers, not just US based ones). The exploitation of labour theory doesn't fly very far with CX.

What rumor you heard is absolute rubbish. I can't say for all routes, but at least for long-haul (Europe, NA, and Australia) routes, the crew gets at least 2 nights, sometimes even 3days.

Last time I flew to Vancouver, I returned to HKG even before the crew did! If I stayed for 2 nights though, I would have had the same crew member!

Absoluletly not true. I can vouch for YVR, YYZ, and LAX. The planes had reserve pilots and Number Ones on board.

Many pilots are also based in their respective home countries. ie YVR, JFK, YYZ, LAX, SFO... and they deadhead around to pick up flights. Sometimes a Captain can fly a frieghter on day from HKG to ANC. Get off, deadhead to YVR to see his family for a few days, and then fly back to HKG on a passenger aircraft a week later, and return to YVR a few days later.

In fact, CX tech crews have the best working conditions around due to their multiple bases around the world.

[This message has been edited by Guy Betsy (edited Feb 06, 2004).]

Given that the crew get nearly 24 hours in SIN on some itinaries (CX715 out, CX716 back), no chance of same day turnarounds on longer routes.

Knowing a friend who works as cabin crew in CX, I can confirm that long-haul routes will have at least 2-night stay at the port. There are several turnover flights within Asia, namely TPE, MNL, BKK, KUL etc. Other routes such as Japan or SIN will have 1-night stay. Not sure if the same applies to pilots.

Yeah! When I was in the SYD airport, i was so excited to fly to HKG by an Airbus 333. I was surprised that there were 36 cabin crew who were boarding on A333. But 22 cabin crews werent working, they wore clothes whereas the others were working with their uniform. All of cabin crew wore uniforms when there were in the airport only. Maybe 22 cabin crew stayed in Sydney for one day only.

Fascinating. Naively I would think they need the same number for cabin crew into/out of Australia. Did they have extra service inbound for the Grand Prix or some other event? Or some VIP that needed to be served by a retinue of 22? It isn't even a prime number ....