Slide 1: Constantly changing time zones, a different bed every night.

Noisy hotels in
close proximity to the airport. These are just a few challenges airline crew members
encounter while attempting to be fresh and well rested for the thousands of passengers
they transport each day.
Slide 2: With all of these challenges, it could be relatively easy for a crew member to
become fatigued. Fatigue can adversely affect crew members decision making abilities.
There have been several accidents where crew member fatigue was a major
contributing factor.
Slide 3: Fatigue is a physiological state of reduced mental or physical performance
capability. This is a result of sleep loss or extended wakefulness, circadian phase or
workload, mental and or physical activity that can impair a crew member's alertness
and ability to safely operate an aircraft or perform safety related duties.
Slide 4: It is very important that you recognize the effects of fatigue on performance.
This course will also inform you of alertness management strategies that may help to
both prevent and counter fatigue.
Slide 5: Take, for example, the tragic Air India Express crash. Flight 812. In 2010, the
Boeing 737 800 aircraft was scheduled to fly from Dubai to Mangalore International
Airport. Due to a relatively short runway and the terrain surrounding the airfield. Air
India Express designates Mangalore as a captain only airport.
Slide 6: During the flight, it is reported that the captain displayed several signs of being
fatigued, including sleeping for over 90 minutes. When it came time to execute the
difficult landing, the captain was well above the normal glide path, ignored the first
officer's repeated suggestions to go around and touched down nearly 2000ft beyond
the normal touchdown zone.
Slide 7: The captain also did not use Mac's manual wheel braking and reverse thrust,
which would have most likely saved the aircraft from crashing. Instead, the 737 ran off
the runway, killing 158 passengers and crew members. Had the crew been well rested,
this accident could very well have been prevented.
Slide 8: To help prevent accidents such as these airlines and regulatory agencies have
engaged in a cooperative, proactive approach to help mitigate crew member fatigue.
Some regulatory agencies have increased crew member required rest periods.
Slide 9: Airlines have incorporated a fatigue risk management system, FMS, to help
research causes of fatigue and prevent tired crew members from operating flights. Our
discussion today will focus on the FMS program and what it means to you as a crew
member.
Slide 10: In this training course, we will discuss the following topics. Fatigue. Risk
Management Overview. Sleep Science Fatigue. Risk Management System Operation.
Evaluating Personal Hazards. Factors Affecting Sleepiness. Misconceptions about
sleep. Effects on flight Operations. On fatigue Responsibilities. Get ready. Wake up. We
are about to start.
Slide 11: Fatigue Risk Management Overview. Have you ever felt exhausted from a
long day at work or had your sleep repeatedly interrupted in the middle of the night?
If you answered yes, like most people, you have been fatigued.
Slide 12: Fatigue can either be acute or prolonged in nature. Either way, it is a serious
issue because it affects a crew member's alertness and ability to make important safety
decisions.
Slide 13: Recently there has been a lot of research on fatigue. There is a new
understanding of how to approach matters concerning fatigue. Crew members getting
adequate sleep is of vital importance for restoring and maintaining all aspects of
wakening functions. Another important factor is a daily rhythm in performing mental and
physical work and in the ability to fall asleep and stay asleep. These rhythms are driven
by the daily cycle of the circadian biological clock in the brain.
Slide 14: Traditionally, fatigue has only been dealt with by regulators in a reactive
manner. After fatigue is found as a contributing factor in a major accident, regulatory
agencies revisit how to prevent crew members from working a flight fatigued.
Slide 15: Let's start with taking a look at what the regulation says concerning fatigue.
No crew member must allow their task achievement decision making to deteriorate to
the extent that flight safety is endangered because of the effects of fatigue, rest periods
must provide sufficient time to enable crew members to overcome the effects of the
previous duty and to be well rested by the start of the following flight duty period.
Slide 16: Furthermore, a crew member must not perform allocated duties on board an
aircraft when under the influence of psychoactive substances or alcohol, or when unfit
due to injury, fatigue, medication sickness or other similar causes. This means that
fatigue becomes very important if it reduces efficiency or otherwise degrades
performance of the crew members on board an aircraft.
Slide 17: Usually the solution is increased rest periods and decreased working hours.
While this approach seems to make sense, it is still a one size fits all approach that
does not cater to the individual or take into account scientific sleep research.
Slide 18: The firm's goal is to bridge this gap, to be proactive in making sure crew
members do not report for duty and certainly not operate a flight fatigued. It takes into
account that each person is different. There might be instances where certain events
fatigue one person while they do not affect another.
Slide 19: If crew members are fatigued, they are encouraged to disclose this
information to the company free from punitive action. In addition to fatigue reports,
Fatigue Risk Management System uses years of sleep science research to create
a multi-layered approach to combating fatigue in the airplane.
Slide 20: Sleep science helps focus on several aspects of fatigue that are often
overlooked by regulators. For example, the cumulative effect of sleep deprivation,
quality sleep and circadian rhythms. We will discuss sleep science in the next section.
Slide 21: The International Civil Aviation Organization. Icao has recognized fatigue risk
management systems as an essential part of aviation safety. They now require
operators to incorporate fatigue risk management systems into their broad safety
management system. Sms umbrella.
Slide 22: This requirement is a great step in the right direction to further improve the
safest mode of transportation in the world.
Slide 23: Sleep science. To begin our discussion on sleep science, let's first look at
what occurs during a typical sleep cycle. Sleep is composed of two distinct states non-
REM non-rapid eye movement and REM rapid eye movement.
Slide 24: When a person first falls asleep, they enter into a lighter stage of sleep called
Non-rapid eye movement non-REM. During non-REM sleep, psychological and mental
activities are slowed. For example, heart and breathing rates. Non-rem sleep is divided
into three stages, with the deepest sleep occurring during stage three.
Slide 25: People awoken from non-REM sleep will generally not remember any
dreams. Many referred to these stages as an active body with an inactive brain. First,
the body enters into stages one and two of non-REM sleep, which is characterized by
lighter sleep.
Slide 26: It is not difficult to awaken someone in these stages. Stages three are
characterized by deep, slow brain wave sleep. It is usually difficult to awaken someone
in these stages.
Slide 27: There is usually very little mental activity during non-REM stage three. If
awakened during stage three, it may take some time to wake up and the person will feel
sleepy and perhaps disoriented for 10 to 15 minutes. This phenomenon is called sleep
inertia.
Slide 28: Depending on the individual. After 80 or 90 minutes of non-REM sleep, the
body progresses from stage three, then briefly to stage two of non-REM sleep, then
enters the first phase of REM sleep.
Slide 29: Brain activity during REM sleep is similar to when the body is awake. Dreams
occur during this sleep phase behind closed eyelids. Eyeballs move rapidly at quick
infrequent intervals as opposed to non-REM sleep. Rem sleep inhibits actions by the
body while the brain activity is high.
Slide 30: Normally in most healthy adults, the body will alternate between non-REM
and REM sleep every 90 minutes. As you may have noticed at first sleep onset, the
body concentrates on relieving the brain of high wave activity.
Slide 31: Over the course of a typical night, non-REM and REM sleep occurs in cycle
with about 60 minutes of non-REM sleep, followed by 30 minutes of REM sleep. This
90 minute cycle repeats itself throughout a typical sleep period.
Slide 32: As sleep progresses during the night and closer to waking, the body prepares
itself to wake up with more of a concentration on REM cycles with higher brain activity.
This cycling of non-REM and REM sleep is referred to as the circadian body clock
cycle. The human body is programmed to commence this cycle at night time. It is
difficult for the human body to get quality sleep in the presence of light.
Slide 33: Using this basic foundation of sleep science. Let's draw a few conclusions
that are applicable to crew members. Let's say you are on a long overnight flight. Your
company and regulations allow one crew member to take a nap at a time. How long
should this crew member be allowed to nap?
Slide 34: Using what we just learned. You would want to awaken the crew member
during the lighter non-REM stages? 1 or 2. These usually occur up to 40 minutes after
first falling asleep.
Slide 35: People woken up during these phases are less likely to encounter sleep
inertia. Sleep inertia is the grogginess you feel after waking up from a deeper phase of
sleep. Decision making is impaired for several minutes during sleep inertia. It is still
probably a good idea to awaken the crew member several minutes before they will be
required to make critical decisions.
Slide 36: For our next scenario. Let's say the crew has gone through a long day with
maintenance issues, several flight legs and thunderstorms. The entire crew will have
had higher than normal brain activity during the daytime. The risk for fatigue with this
crew is high. They will probably need additional sleep and encounter longer than
normal non REM cycles to relieve the brain of the strenuous activity of the day.
Slide 37: If a crew member is not able to have a full rest period of regular circadian
body clock cycles, he or she could become fatigued due to sleep loss. It is important to
note that lost sleep cannot be traded for additional sleep at a later date at a 1 to 1 ratio.
Slide 38: The brain could have been active for so long from these lost sleep periods
that the individual may even encounter a full night's rest of only non REM sleep. Studies
have shown that crew members experiencing sleep loss usually need two quality
nighttime sleep periods before returning to a regular sleep cycle.
Slide 39: Perhaps you noticed that we have mentioned the term quality sleep several
times. While you might have had your own definition for this term, sleep science says
that quality sleep is when non-REM and REM cycles proceed throughout the sleep
period uninterrupted.
Slide 40: The quality of sleep will decline given the more frequent waking events. The
restorative value of the sleep period will be reduced and the crew member will likely
wake up fatigued.
Slide 41: The amount and structure of sleep's changes profoundly over a life span. It is
not that older individuals need less sleep, but it appears that with age, our ability to
obtain consolidated and continued periods of nocturnal sleep decreases with increased
age, sleep becomes less deep. Most non-REM stage three disappear and more
disrupted.
Slide 42: These changes can be seen in individual starting as early as 50 years of age
and is a normal part of the aging process. For example, a long haul flight crew member
aged 50 to 60 had a daily percentage of sleep loss, 3.5 times greater during trip
schedules than those aged between 20 to 30 years.
Slide 43: Some of the factors common to crew members that produce waking events
could include phone calls, text messages, loud aircraft flying overhead nearby,
automobile traffic, trains, uncomfortable beds and sunlight. As part of the fatigue risk
management system, airlines and regulators cooperatively figure out how to mitigate
these factors.
Slide 44: The quality of sleep can be as critical as the quantity of sleep in restoring an
individual. If an individual obtains eight hours of sleep but the sleep is disrupted, then
upon awakening, the individual may feel as if only a few hours of sleep were obtained.
There are many diverse reasons for disrupted sleep from environmental causes, for
example, noise, light to physical sleep disorders.
Slide 45: As opposed to nocturnal creatures such as bats. Humans are programmed
to be active during the daytime and asleep at night. The circadian body clock has a
strong sensitivity to light. In order to obtain proper rest, it is important to synchronize
one's circadian clock onto a 24 hour cycle.
Slide 46: Bright light too late at night will make the body believe it is earlier in the day
slowing down the circadian clock. Light exposure too early in the morning will speed up
the circadian clock, making the body believe that it is later in the day. Constant
changing of these circadian rhythms can lead to fatigue, displacing the body away from
its normal 24 hour cycle.
Slide 47: To combat these factors, be sure to avoid bright lights before going to bed. If
you get in late and have an afternoon showtime the following day, use the hotel's
drapes to block out the morning sunlight. Gradually add more light as you wake up in
the morning.
Slide 48: Flying across several time zones can also cause an unnatural shift in the
body's perception of day and night. This type of flying can cause a form of fatigue
called jet lag. The more time zones, flight and cabin crews cross, the more difficult it is
to adapt to the arrival airports. Light and social cycles. Generally, it is more difficult to
adapt when traveling eastbound rather than westbound, as most people's circadian
clocks generally are on a cycle longer than 24 hours.
Slide 49: Traditionally, most air carriers would only give crew members a day to adapt
to the local time zone before having them fly again. Studies have shown after transiting
several time zones, humans need several days to adapt to the new theatre before they
can return to a normal circadian cycle.
Slide 50: To help Quicken adaptation. It is recommended to eat, sleep and be awake
at the normal time for the local time zone. Jet lag will be much harder to overcome if a
crew member starts the trip with sleep debt, so it is important to be well rested before
embarking on a long haul trip.
Slide 51: Another commonly held belief is that after sleep loss, an individual has to
make up that sleep by sleeping a number of hours equal to those lost. Scientific
laboratory studies have demonstrated that following sleep deprivation recovery, sleep is
deep more non-REM stage three rather than extended. During recovery sleep, an
individual may sleep somewhat longer, but the most notable feature is the increase in
deep sleep.
Slide 52: Another factor that could contribute to crew member fatigue is a sleep
disorder. A sleep disorder can be hereditary or acquired due to several factors. While
we will not discuss each type of sleep disorder, it is important to know that should you
suspect that you have a sleep disorder, seek immediate medical help. Do not self-
medicate with drugs as this could worsen your condition or even create drug
dependence.
Slide 53: During this section, we have mostly discussed how and why the body gets
fatigued. Now let's talk about what actually could happen should you become fatigued.
You will notice that you will become less alert and less functional. Should the sleep debt
accumulate, you might notice yourself accidentally falling asleep on the job for brief
periods of time.
Slide 54: Complex tasks and communications are also greatly inhibited by fatigue. One
of the biggest hazards of sleep restriction is the more fatigued you are, the less reliable
you will be at accessing your own functionality. This is why it is important that if you
notice a fellow crew member exhibiting signs of fatigue, you should consult with him or
her.
Slide 55: Ask the crew member if they are feeling all right and if they are getting enough
rest. If not, encourage the crew member to report their fatigue to their air carrier. In the
next section, we will discuss how air carriers use a frms to mitigate fatigue.