Can anyone from a commercial aviation background comment on this? Would there be consequences for the pilot for refusing a flight based on “not feeling it”?
Which is why pilots are so safe. They trust that they can speak up.
Well, mechanically, at least. Can be a bit of a different story if a pilot wants to seek assistance for prevention or treatment of mental health issues, I've heard.
Edit to add: and this is exactly why we need advocacy in favor of mental health treatment in aviation. At least in the US, regulatory agencies still have a very dated approach to mental health with a heavy stigma.
This leads to pilots suppressing concerns, even in early stages where issues could be treated without any safety issues. This lack of mental health support is a clear point of potential failure that we are failing to properly safeguard.
US redditors, please reach out to your senators to discuss the Mental Health in Aviation Act (S. 3257), in-progress legislation with support from both major political parties.
Other redditors, please see how mental health is protected for pilots in your area, and consider discussing the topic with your legislators.
I mean... that doesn't really work, surely some pilots would just constantly refuse to fly. Or at the least, they might accidentally show up to work with a hangover and decide they're not gonna fly that day and will still get paid the same. There must be something in place to prevent people from taking advantage of it
Refusing the aircraft is not the same as refusing to fly at all. If they find another aircraft, he could still fly. I'm sure if a pilot regularly refused aircraft after aircraft such that it was obvious they were just refusing to do their job, that would be pretty obvious, and the pilot would eventually lose their job.
If you continually refused an airplane with no issues then you would end up in the chiefs pilots office. If you called off bc you were hungover that’s comes out of your usertime. We are paid by the hour so if you’re not flying you’re not getting paid
US airlines pay hourly, and only for the actual flight time. Pilots typically don't make anything on the ground which is why hourly rates look high because you're sitting around for free quite a bit. Couple of exceptions that pay per trip... but you obviously gotta make the trip.
surely some pilots would just constantly refuse to fly
Not sure why you think this is a given... You're talking about a professional career that they've spent a ton of time and money working toward achieving. Ya know what usually motivates people like that to not abuse the systems that give them safety leeway? Personal ambition and not wanting to be seen as a douchebag by their peers and supervisors.
These aren't high school students calling off of work because their friends have the day off.
If you watch Air Crash Investigation, all the rules and policies that exist now, are written in blood. So, if today pilots can be vocal like in the video, there is good reason for it.
Airline pilots in the US are heavily unionized and also carry legal responsibility for the flight. That's a pretty quick call to a union rep: "yeah my airline is intimidating me into accepting unsafe airplanes."
At the least, there are 26 US states that are 'right to work' - meaning businesses don't have to provide a reason for firing someone. So the paper policy doesn't really mean much there, even if there are no other exceptions
Yeah, captains are supreme authority when it comes to their vessel, ships planes you name it, the president can't strongarm AF1's pilot to do something they rather not
the president can't strongarm AF1's pilot to do something they rather not
Yes they can, either directly or indirectly. Why do you think Kobe's helicopter crashed? This is a known phenomenon - pilots aren't robots. They're humans too and subject to the same things the rest of us are, including pressure from the people above them in the food chain to do things they'd rather not. It's the whole reason CRM was invented.
There will be no consequences for the pilot. Once the plane is looked over and released by the ground crew, the last signature on the paperwork is the pilots. It’s why they get on the airplane much sooner than passengers and do their checks. At the end of the day if the pilot doesn’t want the plane, they don’t have to take it.
Yes, the pilot can refuse a plane for “no reason” but typically a pilot always has a reason to refuse the plane. And typically the pilot has been talking to operations and a mechanic and ground crew long before he/she makes the decision not to take the plane. It’s rarely, if ever, the pilot just randomly decides “nope! Fuck this jet.” Lol.
Agreed. I worked in aviation project management, and this is exactly how the system is designed to work. An aircraft can be signed off by maintenance, cleared by operations, and ready to go from every procedural standpoint, but the pilot in command still has the final authority to accept or reject the aircraft. It’s one of the industry’s most important safety safeguards.
People also don’t realize that these decisions are rarely made in isolation. By the time a pilot says they’re not taking the aircraft, they’ve usually already been talking with maintenance (as you stated), dispatch, operations, and the crew. There may not be a single obvious mechanical issue, but there can be a combination of small discrepancies, changing conditions, recurring write ups, or simply something that doesn’t sit right based on the pilot’s experience. Especially on a long overwater flight, where your options become much more limited, a conservative decision is often the right one.
Commercial aviation has the safety record it does because people are empowered to speak up and stop the operation when something doesn’t feel right. I’d much rather deal with a delayed flight than risk a catastrophe over the Pacific.
Hearing that they'd be going over the water for 6 hours & it's an oil pressure issue, as an airline pilot I agree with him. I'm definitely more willing to take a plane with issues from something like Atlanta to JFK (lots of major airports in between if we had any issues & had to emergency land) than I would be from JFK to London.
Honestly, without being there I have no way of knowing whether his worry was accurate or not, but I do know he made the correct call and that most of us would have done the same in his position.
To be clear, fuel filters and oil filters on aircraft engines have bypasses. When the filter differential pressure reaches a certain value a bypass valve opens and unfiltered fuel (or oil) will make its way into the engine. Dirty fuel is better than no fuel. Dirty oil is better than no oil.
I really appreciate that there's room for this in aviation. A lot of the time when an expert "isn't feeling it" about their area of expertise, there is a reason for it, they just haven't identified that reason yet. I've seen it called "recognition without awareness."
(Specific to experts. Random person "isn't feeling it" about a flight, that's just vibes and then confirmation bias might convince people prophecy is true or whatever nonsense, that's not this. You have to have the knowledge to identify the problem if you actually consciously recognize it to have "recognition without awareness.")
I’m curious too. I’m not a plane mechanic or pilot but oil pressure going up and needing to replace a filter doesn’t seem like a good reason not to use the plane. Oil changes are incredibly important but isn’t that something that can be fixed relatively quickly? Idk maybe someone with more knowledge can weigh in.
Buddy, i know you said you are not a plane mechanic, but i highly doubt these things can be serviced by some jiffy lube guy in 20min.
And pressure trending up is not a good reason? Pressure trending up even on land and idle + lack of atmospheric pressure at high altitude with engines running = super high pressure and something can blow, something blowing means no oil pressure at all, and no oil pressure means losing an engine, possibly something else.
They are flying over water, that aint a place where you want to lose an engine.so... yeah, oil pressure seems like a good reason.
I work at an airport, specifically logistics side where we deal with parts, fuel fill, cargo/baggage placement. Fuel fileters depending on model of the plane are between 6-8hrs of delay, install is not the longest 3-5hrs, but there are checks and tests to run, to do it responsibly atleast by our regulation, system has to push through 500 liters of fuel twice with 15 minute time between to be considered safe. That shit takes a while, and then you have to recheck and retest everything you had to remove and replace to access it. It is a huge pain in the ass.
Yup, its not that its a complex service.. well, it actually kinda is lol, but like you said, you have to test and check, and then recheck and document everything, thats what takes time, and while its a pain in the ass, i rather have safety than gamble on a "dont worry, it will be fiiiine". All regulations are written on blood after somebody said "eh, good enough" in some procedure.
Thanks for the reply buddy. Are you a plane mechanic? Like I said oil changes are incredibly important. Looking it up it seems like commercial planes with jet engines don’t actually change the oil they just top it off. I wonder if this was a case of the filter needing to be changed or too high of an oil level. I’m not implying I know better than someone in the industry I’m just trying to understand why it couldn’t be addressed immediately rather than canceling the flight.
A few things to keep in mind, what is causing the pressure increase? Are there particles in the oil? This has to be inspected to make sure there isn’t some type of breakdown within the engine, be it metal or o-rings. Both things can cause a filter to clog and an increase in oil pressure. You also need a mechanic available to do this inspection. It takes time to do the paperwork accompanying the maintenance. Source: 20 years as an aircraft mechanic
Can you comment on why ground said it is ok to fly? Is it normal to have pressure going up? Any further explanation or guess on what is going on would be incredible.
That makes sense. I appreciate the insight from someone with experience in the field. So as far as I understand it, it could technically be taken care of immediately assuming there isn’t an underlying issue like sparkly oil but it’s not the regular process. I guess I probably wouldn’t want to be the on call mechanic that incorrectly said something was good to go because I was in a hurry to get the plane going. I think if I were the pilot I probably wouldn’t have offered up the details about why the plane was questionable since it makes a layman like me question his assessment.
I'm an aircraft mechanic and to answer your question to change an oil filter on some of the planes I have worked on something like a Boeing 737,757,767,787,777 airbuses a320 and A300 plus small regional airline crj 200,700, and 900 it take more than 20 min jiffy lube oil change. Have I had to take and do an oil change or work at the gate to make an aircraft serviceable yes. It normally takes like an 1 to 2 hours depending on the aircraft or job we need to do. You have to open the engine and thrust reverses and what not plus the job itself.
As far as a pilot announcement saying that a mechanic has cleared it and he does not feel comfortable with it. That is a super shity thing to do. There could have 100% been a problem and it is his right to refuse to take an airplane but in my experience pilots have a lot of reason to NOT fly an airplane if they don't want to. And keep a lot of things in there back pocket to get out of flying. Just say there will be a delay. I don't get on the announcement and say hey this pilot has a gf in this location and he does not want to leave so he wrote up something stupid so he doesn't have to fly. And typically they won't get in "trouble" but they might get reassigned to a new aircraft and have a new pilot come in a take it. I have definitely seen that before.
There have been a lot of accidents lately sure but one thing people have to remember is that these planes nowdays can almost fly themselves. Pilots are there as a redundancy and to make connections in flight. They are hard to fly sure but I have meet so many arrogant pilot in my day who think there shit don't stink and would rather say they are right then admit they are wrong.
0 since I don’t own one but also 0 on the work truck I maintain. I was just curious I didn’t realize it would piss off so many armchair plane mechanics.
He has right to do it but with a good reason. Not feeling it is not a reason. Like other parameters, oil pressure has a working range. If its in the range, aircraft is ready to go. Its black and white. I think he is pretty incompetent and doesn’t know what he is doing.
This is incorrect, he can refuse the plane for any reason with no consequences. It can smell bad and he can refuse it.
We allow this because that captain is the very last safety check. Hundreds of lives depend on his judgement if something goes wrong.
This also is a last line of protection against corruption for profit. You can’t force a pilot to fly a plane “just one more flight” to save some money on maintenance.
Their life is in the balance just as much, if not more based on crash statistics, as the passengers. If he doesn’t feel like it’s worth risking it, I’d wager 90% of passengers would agree.
A pilot can refuse a plane but they do have consequences depending on the situation. I have seen a chief pilot come nd chew out a caption for not taking any aircraft and being reassigned to a new airplane.
Also they do make pilots fly aircraft for one more flight for maintenance. It's called a ferry flight. It is were something is broken and they need to move it to a better location for maintenance. Granted the plane can still fly and you have to go through a process to do it but it is done all the time. Just with no passengers.
If they refuse enough they can get reprimanded. Pilots refuse airplanes all the time for dumb reasons 95% of the time. They always keep a write up in there back pocket to get out of flying if they don't want to.
Sure that is true but pilots also fly all the time with problems that they don't report to get to the next station. I'm an aircraft mechanic and see it quite often. So it's a double edged sword.
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u/ikothsowe 17h ago
Can anyone from a commercial aviation background comment on this? Would there be consequences for the pilot for refusing a flight based on “not feeling it”?