Flight attendants need a break from Congress

The U.S. government could perhaps make the nation’s commercial airways healthier, saner and maybe even safer with a relatively simple step: ensure that flight attendants get enough sleep.

It might even strike a blow for gender equality, too.

The flight attendants union has been pushing for some time now for federal legislation that would require airlines to give them the same minimum 10 hours rest between flights that pilots must receive. Now it’s true that flight attendants are not in the cockpit flying the aircraft, as they are the first to admit. But they are also doing a lot more than serving coffee and tea.

“Since Sept. 11, we became the last line of defense in aviation security,” said Sarah Nelson, a United Airlines flight attendant who became international president of The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO, in June 2014. “Flight attendants handle threats and security threats all the time that many passengers don’t even know about.”

Flight attendants make the case that they are aviation’s first responders, who must prepare for everything from a passenger’s heart attack to an emergency evacuation. In addition, they find themselves refereeing so many passenger conflicts on ever-more crowded planes these days that they should probably be wearing black-and-white striped uniforms.

That’s why they say they need at least 10 hours of a mandated rest period to avoid fatigue that makes it harder to carry out their duties. As things stand now, airline scheduling means that a good chunk of time when cabin crews should have down time is spent traveling back and forth to the airport or handling other duties. Bills that would grant at least 10-hour rest periods are working their way through Congress.

But the airline industry argues that the rules setting a 10-hour rest period for the flight crew makes sense because pilot fatigue increases the risk of making an error that could trigger a catastrophic accident. That’s not the case with the cabin crew, the airlines say.

“That same analogy simply does not apply for flight attendants, nor is there any data analysis demonstrating there is a safety or national security issue that needs to be addressed,” said Melanie Hinton, a spokeswoman for Airlines for America, a group that represents the industry. She also said that such a rule could be “potentially unconstitutional” because it would interfere with collective bargaining agreements in place between airlines and the flight attendant unions.

“Labor unions already have the ability to collectively bargain for differing work and rest hours with their respective employers. There is no need for Congress to interfere with the employee/employer relationship,” she said via email. “We are in the safest period of aviation history, an achievement reached through a shared commitment by the FAA, the airlines and their employees.”

Under current regulations, cabin crews must receive a minimum of nine hours rest between shifts. That period can be reduced to eight hours, and often is. But following such a shortened rest period, flight attendants are supposed to be given an extra hour of rest, making it 10 hours between flights.

In reality, however, the nine hours between flights becomes a lot less. Here’s what flight attendants must do during their “rest” periods, between the time the wheels go up and the wheels touch down, union officials say:

Deplane passengers

Exit the airport

Secure transportation to a hotel

Get a meal

Get ready for bed

Wake in time to board transportation to an airport

Pass through security check-points

Board the aircraft

The Federal Aviation Administration set a minimum off-duty rest period for pilots of 10 hours following the February 2009 crash of Colgan Air Flight 3407. Investigators found that pilot fatigue had been a factor in the crash that killed 50 people, including the crew. Under the 2011 FAA rules, a flight crew’s rest period cannot be shortened.

Flight attendants say they should be given the same amount of rest, as is done in every other industrialized country, especially because their jobs have only gotten harder in recent years. In a worst-case scenario, flight attendants must be able to evacuate an aircraft in less than two minutes in the event of an emergency. Although Capt. Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger III justly received credit for saving the lives of passengers and crew when he ditched U.S. Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River in 2009, union officials say it was the cabin crew’s five flight attendants that evacuated themselves and the plane’s 150 passengers without injury.

Flight attendants also have been called upon to help identify - and sometimes repel - potential attackers inside an aircraft. It was cabin crew, along with passengers, who intervened when shoe-bomber Richard C. Reid attempted to ignite explosives aboard American Airlines Flight 63 in 2001 and another shoe-bomber on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 in 2009.

More often, they must be able to deal with medical emergencies aboard an aircraft, ranging from airsick or fainting passengers, to heart attacks or even delivering a baby. They also receive training on dealing with unruly passengers at a time when the airlines are packing more and more people into tighter and tighter spaces. Although the numbers have tapered off from a high of 305 in the year 2001, there were still 145 incidents with unruly air passengers in 2014, the most recent year with complete data.

With planes flying at higher capacities, flight attendants have less ability to move people if they’re sick or having conflicts with surrounding passengers, and they’re less able to sit down or rest themselves. For example, a Boeing 757 used to be staffed with six attendants; now it’s four, Nelson said. Yet, as airlines squeeze in an additional 10 to 12 passengers per plane, those four attendants have to look after 180 to 200 passengers.

Meanwhile, last week’s terrorist attacks in Brussels served as yet another reminder for travelers (as if travelers needed reminding) that public transportation is a target of choice. This time, the attack hit the airport terminal and Metro. But terrorists have also successfully evaded security in the past and managed to pose a threat on board, and cabin crews must remain vigilant for such threats.

“I’m not sure why you would have someone in a safety-sensitive job that they would fight against regulations that would make it safe,” Nelson said. “We’re the only country that doesn’t equalize rest between pilots and flight attendants.”

And that brings us to gender equality. It could be that opposition to a minimum rest period of 10 hours for cabin crews is all about whether you’re at the instrument panel or not. It must be a coincidence that 95 percent of all pilots are male and 83 of all flight attendants are female, the union says.

“Would that be happening if flight attendants were a mostly male workforce?” Nelson asked.

Good question.

Although flight attendants are not at the control stick, they still deserve the same consideration as flight crews when it comes to a minimum period of rest. It’s not just humane, it’s potentially important for everyone’s safety.

(Editors Note: I’m a member of the Communication Workers of America as co-chair of the Washington Baltimore News Guild’s bargaining unit at The Washington Post.)