Two pilots fall asleep mid-flight with more than 150 on board 36,000 feet in the air

[steve from amherst]

wo pilots of an Indonesian airline have come under fire after an incident report revealed they both fell asleep during a January flight with more than 150 people on board. The pilots were unreachable for roughly half an hour, waking to find that the plane had veered off course, the report said. 

The incident occurred on a roundtrip Batik Air Indonesia flight between Halu Oleo Airport in Kendari and Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Jakarta on January 25. During preparation for the first leg of the flight from Jakarta to Kendari, the second-in-command pilot – a 28-year-old with roughly 1,600 hours of flying time – told the pilot in command that he did not have proper rest, according to a report by Indonesia's National Transportation Safety Committee. The commanding pilot, a 32-year-old with roughly 6,300 hours of flying time, allowed the secondary to rest during that leg of the trip for about half an hour. 

On the flight back to Jakarta, which had 153 passengers and four flight attendants on board, the commanding pilot asked the secondary – who napped during the first leg – if he could take a turn to rest, which was granted. A little while later, the pilot woke up and asked the other pilot if they wanted to nap, which they declined. 

About 20 minutes later, the incident report states the second pilot "inadvertently fell asleep" as they were roughly 36,000 feet in the air. 

Air traffic controllers and other pilots attempted to get in contact with the napping pilots to no avail. Then 28 minutes after the last recorded transmission, the commanding pilot woke up and was immediately "aware that the aircraft was not in the correct flight path." 

[Guest]

Imagine being on that flight and reading about this after????

Talk about a magic carpet ride.

[Kivalo]

Given the automated nature of these commercial airliners I'm kind of surprised this doesn't happen more often. I bet it does and we just don't know.

[ViperGTS/Z1]

 

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Kivalo said:

Given the automated nature of these commercial airliners I'm kind of surprised this doesn't happen more often. I bet it does and we just don't know.

I think you're right.

[ICG]

Autopilot works to keep the plane to  its intended destination....

[Kivalo]

We have autopilot on the boats but we only allow them to hold a heading. We have to maintain the overall course manually. It keeps us focused on the job and diesnt allow us time to fall asleep. In theory anyway.

[Jerry 976]