NTSB Report Details Pilot’s Mismanagement of Rest Periods

Last week’s final report from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) on the crash of a Beechcraft Premier I in Georgia on February 20 last year points to the pilot’s failure to follow a number of abnormal system procedures listed in the airplane flight manual, as well as his overall lack of systems knowledge. The Board also specifically cited fatigue stemming from acute sleep loss made worse by the pilot’s ineffective use of opportunities to rest during an extended duty day.

The pilot arrived at Thomson-McDuffie Airport in Georgia at 3:30 a.m. local, after a one-hour drive from home, for the first leg of a trip that ended in Nashville at about 7 a.m. local and required a waiting period of another 12 hours before the return flight to Thomson.

A human-factors specialist factual report showed that between arrival and departure later that day, the pilot squandered his opportunity to rest by accepting or initiating 21 separate phone calls between 7:08 a.m. and 3:42 p.m. local time, which meant “there was very little time to obtain any significant amount of restorative sleep,” Board member Robert Sumwalt pointed out in a concurring opinion. The pilot told investigators he slept four hours during the layover in Nashville.