The airplane doesn’t know if it’s nighttime or if the weather is bad.
Fa·tigue. fuh-teeg – noun
Extreme tiredness, typically resulting from
mental or physical exertion, sleep deprivation
or illness. Known to cause irritability, poor
judgment and blabbering like a caveman
The first time I flew while tired (the word fatigue wasn’t in fashion then) was as a teen flying a Cherokee 140 from Kalamazoo, all-night to Billings, MT. Having survived unscathed, later that summer, I flew another all-nighter to New Bedford, MA, and then several to Denver — that would be Denver Stapleton when it still existed. My fatigue exposure in the military also came while flying long distances after midnight: Nellis AFB, NV to central Florida in a practice run for the 1986 Libya bombing, Vegas to Italy for a NATO exercise (see “Passing Gas,” T &T January 2011) and another to deliver four, factory-new F-16’s from the General Dynamics factory in Texas to Greece. While young and bulletproof then, this retired airline and newbie Citation captain is no longer knobby-kneed nor Kevlar coated. With COVID (kinda) in the rear-view mirror, all manner of travel has resumed, and long days and nights of flying lie ahead.
A Hard Day’s Night
– The Beatles, 1964
When I first upgraded to Captain on the MD-80, my low seniority forced me to fly all-nighters. I’d flown plenty of them as an F.O. in L.A. 17 years earlier, mainly to the East Coast and Guadalajara, Mexico, but I quickly discovered the trips to be more painful than I remembered. My young(er) F.O.s attributed it to my age. Of course, they were right, those insensitive whippersnappers. Then, after integrating our two airlines and transitioning to the B-737, I found myself junior once again, returning to ORD from SFO, PDX, SEA or LAS at 5:30 a.m. I’d arrive tired and grumpy like I’d battled a woolly mammoth. Luckily for those around me, unlike the Air Force missions, the arrivals were without ordnance or that sticky thing from my Passing Gas article. I’ve found myself in the Citation after midnight just a few times, but respect for flexibility and fatigue will be needed as we all attempt to squeeze more work and play into each flying day.
Stupid is, as stupid does
– Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks), 1994
Having no choice but to be flexible and adapt when faced with an all-nighter, I’ve often embraced the philosophy of the famous shrimp boat Captain and long-distance runner: Professor Forrest Gump. Not the box-of-chocolate axiom; the epistemological philosophy of stupid is, as stupid does. To ensure proper rest, my layovers no longer include all-day leisure events like stupid-golf or stupid-tours of the city. And no stupid-socializing and staying up late to have dinner and drinks with the F.O. But our new editor will still benefit from my elucubrating over articles written at that not-so-stupid hotel in Marco Island (as demonstrated by his need to edit my incessant use of parenthetical statements, creative as they may be, my grammatical legerdemain and the ingenious application of made-up words). Strategic time management, and the boredom pursuant, have usurped this geriatric Part 135 captain’s eating/playing/writing regimen. Perhaps with fewer parenthetical statements (such as this) and a power nap, I can transform from a blabbering, cryptograph-chiseling caveman to Professor Gump’s humble and contrite persona to finish this story.
The Power Nap and Sleep Inertia
Do they work? Well, the FAA, airlines, and military have considered allowing cockpit napping for some time–with strict guidelines for the pilot(s) who remain awake in such a scenario. A fine idea but extremely difficult to sell to the flying public—especially in part 135, where the crew would be visible as they snore, drool and talk in their sleep. The AOPA Air Safety Foundation related the story of a G.A. pilot whose “power nap” ended when he awoke unhurt in a cornfield. And then another when a CFI’s micro-nap on final allowed his student to collide with a snow bank. Obviously, strategic napping should only be employed with another awake and alert pilot able to monitor the airplane. At one point, official guidance for power napping was to rest until a pencil would fall from between your fingers. More recently, it was shown that 15-20 minutes is needed to put us at the proper place on the sleep sine-wave chart without developing “sleep inertia” — that is, feeling worse after the nap than if you hadn’t napped at all. Without the luxury of a power nap, how do we combat fatigue to avoid missing a radio call, forgetting a checklist item, or waking up in a cornfield? Here’s a list that is so easy a caveman could do it:
- Get 7-8 hours of sleep every day
- Limit alcohol
- Avoid a large meal
- Stay hydrated
- Use a noise-canceling headset
- Bring along a pax, or better still, another pilot
- Turn on the overhead lights
- Tell the other pilot/person you are sleepy
- Park the plane by 10 p.m.
Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA)
Even if we do all the right things, physical and mental demons may lurk in the sleep-inducing realm of fatigue. Apnea and hypopnea can be defined as total and partial airway obstructions. When you stop breathing while asleep, your brain sends a wake-up call after about 10 seconds. Time zone changes and alcohol can delay that wake-up call by 30 seconds or longer. This can result in significant fatigue and long-term health issues. Why did the Feds get all wound up over sleep apnea a few years ago? Because OSA can result in strokes, depression, arrhythmia, high blood pressure, congestive heart failure, obesity and impotence. That last one shouldn’t affect our flying much, but it’s nice to know that the Feds are concerned about our performance. OSA can be diagnosed through a sleep study, and corrective actions include: losing weight, adjusting sleeping posture or environment, using dental appliances or a CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine, and surgical remedies. Notice that neither alcohol nor sleep-inducing pharmaceuticals are on the list of treatments.
Late night or early morning landings can be a bear if tired.
Body Clock
Summer means pancake breakfasts, poker runs, golf fly-ins, camping with the plane, and the airshow season— along with the accompanying carnival-like food. It brings longer days; we may start flying at sunrise and not put the airplane to bed for another 10-15 hours. A disruption to our normal sleep cycle is inevitable. This means a tired, sunburned and dehydrated pilot, with a tummy full of marginal food, at the controls of a high-performance T&T airplane making the decisions. Circadian rhythm is a physiological cycle. It’s the involuntary result of our need to regenerate for about one-third of each twenty-four hours. It recurs naturally, even in the absence of light fluctuations. There is no way to immediately adjust that rhythm to the needs of our schedule. Current thinking is that it takes one full day to move the cycle by one timezone. Continuing activity into the sleep portion of the cycle increases the risk of fatigue. Also, darkness changes the rules and the risks. Our visual inputs are less at a time when we have been awake longer. Let’s admit it: night flying is more like instrument flying, even with a full moon or visible horizon. Add a disruption of our circadian rhythm, and the resulting degradation to our performance can turn nighttime into a nightmare.
A Normal Procedural Decision; Get A Room
Sometimes we try to squeeze as much recreational time or business efficiencies into the trip as possible before we head home, and it’s easy to let our judgment become distorted. Fatigue is similar to hypoxia; we don’t notice or care as much as we should. And we can convince ourselves that fatigue has a value that is worth the risk. A few years ago, one of our readers mailed me about his fatigue experiences. While driving home one night from the airport, he found himself following the centerline of a road as we would in our airplanes while taxiing. On another flight, he stopped short after recognizing his fatigue. We’ve all been that tired, usually finding a rest stop for a few hours while driving or landing short of our destination when flying. Like practicing a go-around or a divert, once you have landed short a couple of times to sleep, the consternation of adding a day to your trip becomes less of a conundrum and more like a regular procedural decision.
Don’t Get Eaten
The days are getting longer, and a duty day from sunrise to sunset is long. The airplane doesn’t know that the weather is crap or that it’s 11 p.m. and you’re falling asleep. It also doesn’t know that you overflew your destination during the power nap. If you become fatigued, rest. If you don’t, risks increase exponentially, and bad things can happen. To survive among carnivorous predators, the early hominids learned that stupid is, as stupid does. Fatigue can put you into an altered state of consciousness like one induced by sensory deprivation and revert you to a blabbering Neanderthal. Don’t fly fatigued and be the one that gets eaten.
Authors note: An acknowledging head-nod (from me and the attorneys) to Ken Russell’s 1980 sensory deprivation film, Altered States, starring William Hurt, as well as the one-hit-wonder by A-Ha that it inspired: Take on Me. Also, to Tom Hanks in Winston Groom’s Forrest Gump and the Beatles for 1964’s Hard Day’s Night.
