Why is a flight attendant sitting in the captain’s seat of a Jetstar A330 in level flight at around 250 knots airspeed?
And who else was on the flight deck when the first officer posed in the same seat after or before the 305-passenger jet appears to have slightly changed its heading?
CASA says it doesn’t act on anonymous photographs.
We obscured the faces of the flight attendant and first officer, but Crikey will send CASA the unedited images.
There are enough breaches of air safety regulations implicit in these images to result in criminal prosecutions.
The sender of these images points out that the first officer may well have proper cause to be in the left hand seat in providing relief to the captain, or for training purposes if it wasn’t a flight carrying passengers.
However, the air safety regulations only allow appropriately licensed and qualified persons to occupy a control seat while an aircraft is in flight.
The anonymous emailer lists several risks in the situation of the flight attendant in a pilot’s seat.
An instruction for a change in heading or altitude by air traffic control may not be acted upon.
She would be incapable of responding to a TCAS or automated collision alert system warning which is triggered when aircraft are converging courses, and depends on the pilots of each flight diving, climbing or changing course according to a computer generated instruction.
In an emergency procedure caused by a cabin depressurisation or an engine fire she would be occupying a seat urgently required by a pilot.
Our informant is critical of the pilot culture at Jetstar and says, “Due to an industrial requirement of keeping costs low promoting pilots in house, the experience, safety culture and compliance with simple regulatory requirements have been neglected.
“Alan Joyce [currently Jetstar CEO pending taking over that role at Qantas] stated some time ago his concerns that bringing in qualified crew would ‘pollute the Jetstar culture’ . One must wonder exactly what culture he is trying to protect.”
Jetstar this morning launched a full inquiry into the matter and has also notified CASA of its inquiries.
Tell you what Mr Ben Sandilands, how about you and the rest of your ‘Journalistic’ Cohort quit with all this scare mongering to sell yourselves?
Ok, sure, theres a flighty in the left seat, big woop, who says there isn’t a perfectly qualified pilot sitting in the right hand seat at the time? A FULLY FUNCTIONING RIGHT HAND SEAT, one from where the pilot can react to the TCAS or listen in to ATC and react accordingly.
What if the FO had been left for a few mins whilst the Captain had gone to the loo? A lot of airlines require a member of the crew to be up the front to assist in the case of an emergency so the FO isn’t the sole pilot and i’ll tell you right now, if it were me i’d like the flighty who is up there helping me to be seated and safe and in a position to actually provide some kind of assistance as they are meant to be there for.
This could also be allowed under CAR 1988 227
(3) The pilot in command of an aircraft shall admit an authorised person
to the crew compartment and allow that person to occupy the seat or
position appropriate for the performance of his or her duties if the pilot
in command is not of the opinion that the person’s admission to the
crew compartment or occupation of that seat or position, as the case
may be, would endanger the safety of the aircraft.
Penalty: 10 penalty units.
Tell you what Mr Ben Sandilands, how about you and the rest of your ‘Journalistic’ Cohort quit with all this scare mongering to sell yourselves?
Ok, sure, theres a flighty in the left seat, big woop, who says there isn’t a perfectly qualified pilot sitting in the right hand seat at the time? A FULLY FUNCTIONING RIGHT HAND SEAT, one from where the pilot can react to the TCAS or listen in to ATC and react accordingly.
What if the FO had been left for a few mins whilst the Captain had gone to the loo? A lot of airlines require a member of the crew to be up the front to assist in the case of an emergency so the FO isn’t the sole pilot and i’ll tell you right now, if it were me i’d like the flighty who is up there helping me to be seated and safe and in a position to actually provide some kind of assistance as they are meant to be there for.
This could also be allowed under CAR 1988 227
(3) The pilot in command of an aircraft shall admit an authorised person
to the crew compartment and allow that person to occupy the seat or
position appropriate for the performance of his or her duties if the pilot
in command is not of the opinion that the person’s admission to the
crew compartment or occupation of that seat or position, as the case
may be, would endanger the safety of the aircraft.
Penalty: 10 penalty units.
Therefore if the PIC deemed it appropriate for the FA to be in there to enact his/her duties it is entirely permissible if they felt that it would not cause some form of danger. Perhaps next time doing some more research into what your talking about would be appropriate first before misinforming the public with your scaremonger tactics?
Ixixly you’re a dickhead! And obviously a sleazebag pilot defending these clowns fooling around on the job probably from the same organisation. This flight attendant has obviously flashed the cutesy smile and flirted with the pilot to get a snap of her on the flight deck for her Facebook profile. Rules are rules so I guess if there is nothing to worry then CASA should dismiss it I’m guessing. As passengers we are all given lectures from the industry about safety so much so that even mentioning in jest the dreaded four letter word ‘bomb’ inside an aircraft can get you in hot water by over anxious flight staff. Well guess pencil dick, whats good for the goose is good for the gander.
Ben Sandilands! I haven’t heard that name since flight attendant training school in 1978. Even then we were warned about this freeloading “Travel Writer” who only ever wrote good things about the airline industry when he travelled free of charge.Back then, QANTAS was his target of choice, thirty years on and he is still spewing vitriol, uninformed as ever and still bitter. He must have had to pay for something.
Maybe it’s time that he stopped trying to play God? No-one has ever taken him seriously and at his age he is probably writing from his wheelchair in the retirement village and wondering why he never gets visitors.
Once a waste of space, always a waste of space,
He’s obviously miffed that he never got to have his photo taken in the Captains seat, there wouldn’t have been room for him AND his inflated ego!
Usual ocker yobbo shit reporting….grow up asshole…………..you also Jay Star………..yobbo asshole