Video: New rules to prevent pilot fatigue

>> to prevent pilot fatigue in the cockpit have been in the works for some time. today the faa made them official. the regulations date back to the '60s. this comes nearly three years after that deadly commuter plane crash in buffalo where 50 people were killed. a federal investigation found that the regional airliner 's pilot and co-pilot were flying while fatigued. tom costello covers the aviation business and there has been some pushback against these rules that are now official.

>> the airlines themselves felt that the new rules might be too expensive. they're reserving judgment at the moment saying they want to study what the new rules are. the cargo airlines have also said they're going to be too expensive as well. the bottom line as you stated, the whole point of this is to address issues that came up as a result of that crash outside of buffalo. while pilot error was cited as the reason for that crash, as you mentioned, pilot fatigue, long distance commuting, incredibly long and exhausting work hours were all discussed during this investigation. these are decades old issues. so here now are the new rules that the faa has acknowledged going into effect. they don't go into effect two years. to begin, flight time must be limited to eight or nine hours. that depends on what time the pilot takes off and where they're going. multiple time zones , that kind of thing. ten-hour maximum rest period. it used to be eight hours. and you had to find time to sleep in that period. now it's ten hours with an opportunity for eight hours of uninterrupted sleep. you can imagine what that means if you're in an overnight in a hotel somewhere. 30 consecutive hours free from duty every week. consecutive hours is critical there. and pilots now, this is important. pilots must affirm that they are fit for duty at the beginning of their shift. in other words, if you did commute cross country , it is up to you to make sure that you got the sleep before you report for duty. you can't just come across country and then suddenly jump into this cockpit of a plane and expect that you're going to be fit for duty if you're exhausted and you're fighting a cold which is what happened, of course, in the case of that buffalo crash. but, and this is important now. the cargo airlines said this is all way too expensive for us. we can't do this. we fly multiple time zones . we take off at night. they argued that we can't have these rules apply to us. the faa agreed. cargo airlines are exempt. today i asked the d.o.t. secretary, the secretary of the transportation department whether pilot's lives are any less important than airline pilots lives.

>> every life is important. safety is our number one priority. we have an obligation when these rules are developed to make sure that they can meet a cost effective formula, and so we will meet with our friends in the cargo industry and we will explain what this rule does and we will explain the safety aspects of it. and we will encourage them to adopt this.

>> so there you go. mr. ray lahood , the secretary of transportation arguing the cargo airline pilots' lives are important as airline pilot ' lives and he will try to get the ceos to go along willingly. they've fought this all the way. nonetheless, a pretty big change for the nation's airlines as a whole. back to

Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/newsnation/45755100/

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