How Do Pilots Pass The Time On Long Flights?

For most passengers, long-haul flights are a matter of endurance aided by a few drinks, inflight entertainment, and trying to get some sleep between meal services. It is an entirely different matter for the people flying the plane as there are still plenty of things to do even after takeoff. Let’s look at what’s happening on the flight deck during these longer flights…

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[Randomness]

In the words of a retired station manager at LGA: "They take off, they do their paperwork, they eat, they read the Wall Street Journal, and then they spend the ENTIRE rest of the flight talking about how management is running the airline into the ground."

[matthewmcclain]

The more I learn about the airline industry, the more I'm amazed at what humans are capable of. It's easy to feel down, and feel like we're living in a bad time. In reality, we're better off than we have EVER been. Life is a gift.

Just putting so positivity out there. :)

[pjnugent]

Sounds fairly straightforward. Big respect to all airline pilots.

[JohnSmith-ckqk]

Just make sure not to discuss airline pilot scheduling and get so engrossed in the discussion such that you fly past your destination airport

[theboatcheat]

Don’t forget “space invaders” - each pilot picks a radio beacon somewhere on the map display, off the route. Then you take turns entering a radial and range from your chosen beacon… first one to ‘hit’ the aircraft symbol withe the paint of the range and radial wins…

[frankpatrick]

God bless all the pilots in the world. Please keep up the good work. Thank you.

[Jay-hrrh]

The French Pilots even engages in some physical combat in the cockpit during cruise flight.

[desertornado]

All these complex procedures that has been mentioned take only 5% of the time in cruise. With experience these task can be performed in a very quick manner and the rest of the time it's just about monitoring that the airplane is doing what the pilots intents it to do. For the remaining of the time, while chatting is common, more times than not it's extremely hard to keep a conversation for that long resulting in finding other ways to spend the time. Reading books/newspaper/doing crossworks can be either allowed or not depending on individual company policies. On the other hand, most airlines won't allow the use of personal electronic devices (PEDs) but that does not stop pilots from using them anyways. Watching movies and tv series, listening to music/podcast, playing games on a phone/tablet and sleeping (one at the time) are very common practices (the last one is actually allowed by the airlines with limitations on time and phase of flight but these rules too are often breached in one fashion or the other)

[aaflyer]

Actually anything over 8 hours in the USA is required to have a relief pilot. Over 12 hours two relief pilots.

[elisabethj.v.beardsell]

One of the most challenging jobs ever, involving many skills, who many know little of.Kudos to all airline pilots .you deserve your salary and recognition.

[YusafBashir]

Just flew from dubai to london Heathrow this morning on a British airways a380. Always wonder what the pilots are doing when we cruising at 39000 feet

[timmyboyproductions]

On our aircraft we play ping pong across the centre console. Sometimes we play eyespy but it’s more limited at night.

[MarcPagan]

From a former airline pilot....on flights 6+ hours, if a good pilot contract,
sleep is how pilots pass the time :)

"Dozing for dollars" aka a blocked seat in 1st class for a resting pilot.

3 rotating pilots on flights to Europe, Asia, as noted, with 2 pilots always in the cockpit.

[elliotngosa]

Wow this is very informative. Thanks for the video!

[gerardmoran]

Great video! Monitoring fuel burn, keeping up with destination and alternate airport weather are a real concern on some flights. The crew must keep a constant awareness of their nearest divert field in the case of a serious emergency and where they are relative to the equal time points on trans-oceanic flights.

[coasternut]

On short legs, it can actually be quite busy. If it's over 2 hours, Angry Birds is still popular in the airline world

[userbg]

Thanks for this. I always wondered about it. I imagined they have secret bunk beds where they can have a nap mid-flight, but apparently that is not that common. It is a difficult job with long hours, weird times, I wonder if pilots are generally stressed or happy…

[coreyjordan]

Thank you for posting. I didn't know all the details of what pilot do on long-haul. But, its cool. especially since I am in pursuit of becoming a pilot myself. My goal is to become a C.F.I first with all rating, then if possible become a first officer for an regional airline. That would be very cool. Especially coming from past. I was scared of height as a child. "God, always has a master plan for your life".

[laurap.]

Two more important info: they have topáveis-vos differents meals ( Pilots and Captain) in case one is home bad and, when we have only 2 Pilots and one want to exit for a short time, one of the Cabin free hás to stay in the Cockpit ( this after the pilot locked out the Captain and crushed the plane on a mountain....and now the Health center is also obliged to send to the airline Company the results of the periodically check )Health )

[jamesstuart]

"Making sure that you are on course so that you don't get shot down by the Russians" is popular with Korean Air