Flight returns as pilot’s duty ends mid-air
Flight returns as pilot’s duty ends mid-air
(AFP) / 2 November 2012
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A Norwegian plane carrying 40 passengers turned around and returned to an airport hundreds of kilometres away — despite having already started its descent — just so the crew would not have to work overtime.
The plane was about to land in the small northern town of Mosjoen when it turned back to Trondheim, around 350km south, local newspaper Rana Blad said in a report.
“Shortly afterwards, the captain himself said on the tannoy that it was unbelievable, but that it had been decided that we had to turn around,” passenger Steinar Henriksen said.
Company Wideroe, a regional carrier owned by Scandinavian airline SAS, said that the last-minute decision was based on Norway’s strict working time regulations. “Unfortunately, the plane took off with a crew that was about to clock out. We have strict working hours that are imposed by the authorities, which we cannot exceed,” a spokesman for the company, Richard Kongsteien, told the paper.
“If the airplane had landed, it would have had to stay in Mosjoen since we didn’t have a back-up crew there, and the schedule for the rest of the evening would have had to be cancelled,” he said, adding that this would have affected more than 200 passengers.
And all this time I thought this Norwegians and other europeans were smart people. If their duty time was getting over why did they take off in the first place. They might only have had to work a few hours more but were they aware to what inconvenience and hardship they were putting their passengers to due to their irresponsible behaviour
Well ,the law is the law! Nobody is over the law!
Even if they are 200 passengers only kilometers away from destination.
You lost me on this one,,,,