THE DANGERS OF SINGLE-PILOT OPERATIONS Air Line Pilots Association, Int’l 7950 Jones Branch Drive Suite 400S McLean, VA 22102 703-481-4440
[email protected] • www.alpa.org 2019 Foreword from alpa president joe depete The Air Line Pilots Association, Int’l, has been committed to safety since its founding in 1931. Our motto—“Schedule with Safety”—guides every decision our pilots make. For nearly nine decades, technology has advanced us from flying wings of canvas and wood to those of aluminum and carbon fiber, cruising in the stratosphere at three-quarters the speed of sound—and doing so with an unprecedented record of safety. This white paper articulates the Association’s position in maintaining the role and recognizing the importance of the most vital safety feature in transport- category aircraft now and for the foreseeable future: two experienced, “This white trained, and rested professional pilots in the cockpit. paper articulates the Association’s The past decade is proof positive of how pilots have helped make commercial aviation the safest mode of transportation in the world. Today, millions of position in passengers and tons of cargo travel to destinations around the globe with maintaining ease and with little concern of arriving safely, thanks to the tremendous the role and efforts of aviation professionals. Airline pilots and our aviation colleagues recognizing the work hard each and every day to maintain the U.S. airline industry’s importance of incredible safety record, but our work has become so routine that some the most vital industry groups have overlooked the important safety role served by a pilot physically present in the cockpit, and efforts have been proposed to safety feature research or introduce single-pilot or remote-controlled operations to the in transport- air transportation system.