U.S. senators are insisting that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) do something about airline pilots who regularly make long commutes prior to their flights.

The lawmakers are concerned that in the year since 50 people were killed in a regional airline crash near Buffalo, NY, the FAA hasn't taken any action to prevent pilots who commute long distances from showing up for work fatigued.

On February 12, the Colgan Air Bombardier DHC-8-400 (N200WQ) operating as Continental Connection Flight 3407 was on an instrument approach to Buffalo-Niagara International when it crashed into a residence in Clarence Center, NY, about five miles northeast of the airport. The two pilots, two flight attendants, and 45 passengers on board the airplane were killed, One person on the ground was also killed, and the airplane was destroyed by impact forces and a post-crash fire. Pilot fatigue is thought to have been a factor in the fatal accident.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, urged the FAA to look into the issue of long pilot commutes.

Seventy percent of the pilots based at Newark, NJ, for Colgan Air, the regional carrier which operated the doomed flight for Continental Airlines, commuted from other cities, and 20 percent commuted from more than a 1,000 miles away, an investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board found.

Sen. John Thune (R-SD) said he was "somewhat alarmed" by the large share of Colgan pilots who commute long distances.

Peggy Gilligan, the FAA's associate administrator for aviation safety, told the senate panel it's up to pilots to show up for work rested and ready to fly. "Many pilots have commuted throughout their careers and have done so very responsibly," Gilligan said, adding that commuting, long a widespread practice among commercial transport pilots, clearly hasn't affected safety since the overall accident rate is very good.

But Gilligan said the FAA would attempt to learn more, noting the issue is complex with no easy solution. She said the FAA will seek data on how many pilots skip sleep the night before a flight. The FAA will ask carriers to examine voluntary safety reports by crews to see how often the subject of missed sleep surfaces.

Regarding pilot flight Time, rest and fatigue, Gilligan said:

When (FAA) Administrator (Randy) Babbitt was last here he told you that the aviation rulemaking committee (ARC) he convened for the purpose of making recommendations on flight time, rest and fatigue, consisting of representatives from the FAA, industry and labor organizations, provided him with recommendations for a science-based approach to fatigue management in early September. While we were extremely pleased with the product provided, the ARC did not reach a consensus agreement on all areas and was not charged with doing any type of economic analysis.

Consequently, in spite of the Administrator's direction for a very aggressive timeline in which to develop a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), his hope that a rulemaking proposal could be issued by the end of last year was not realized. The complexities involved with these issues are part of the reason why the FAA has struggled to finalize proposed regulations on fatigue and duty time that were issued in the mid-1990s. However, with the Administrator's continued emphasis on this topic, we hope to issue an NPRM this spring. Although this is slightly later that we originally hoped, it is still an extremely expedited schedule, and I can assure you the FAA team working on this is committed to meeting the target.

One of the issues contributing to fatigue that I know is of interest to many of you is that of pilots who commute by air to their job. I would like to describe some of the emails and letters the Administrator has been receiving on the issue of commuting from pilots who choose to commute by air to their job. As you can imagine, those pilots who commute responsibly are understandably concerned that they could be forced to relocate because of the irresponsible actions of a few. Should some sort of hard and fast commuting rule be imposed, it could result in families being separated, people being forced to sell homes at a loss, or even people being forced to violate child custody agreements. It is important to keep in mind these personal accounts because, to people not familiar with the airline industry, the issue of living in one city and working hundreds of miles away in another does not make sense. But in the airline industry, this is not only a common practice, it is one airline employees have come to rely on. So we want to emphasize these issues are complex and, depending on how they are addressed, could have significant impacts on people's lives.

As the Administrator stated when he appeared before you in December, the core of many of the issues facing the air carrier industry today is professionalism. It is the duty of the flight crew to arrive for work rested and ready to perform their jobs, regardless of whether they live down the street from the airport or a thousand miles away. Professionalism is not something we can regulate, but it is something to which we must encourage and urge pilots and flight crews to aspire.

Deborah Hersman, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), testified that:

The crash of Flight 3407 gave the NTSB an opportunity to reexamine fatigue in aviation, an issue that has been on our Most Wanted List of Transportation Safety Improvements since 1990. Numerous accident investigations, research data, and safety studies show that flight crews who are on duty but have not obtained adequate rest present an unnecessary risk to the traveling public. Fatigue results from continuous activity, inadequate rest, sleep loss or nonstandard work schedules. The effects of fatigue include slowed reaction time, diminished vigilance and attention to detail, errors of omission, compromised problem solving, reduced motivation, decreased vigor for successful completion of required tasks, and poor communication.

Although the schedules of both pilots of Flight 3407 were within flight and duty time requirements, the flight crew was likely fatigued according to factual information gathered by NTSB investigators. The night before the accident, the captain likely did not obtain quality sleep because he slept in the company crew room, and his sleep time was interrupted, as evidenced by multiple log-ins to the company scheduling system at 2151, then at 0310, and again at 0726. At the time of the accident, the captain had been awake at least 15 hours. A 1994 NTSB study identified performance degradation in accident flight crews when they have been awake for 12 hours.

Similarly, the first officer likely was not properly rested when she reported for duty. The night before the accident, she commuted from Seattle to Newark, changing planes shortly after midnight in Memphis, and arriving in Newark at 0630, which was 0300 Seattle time. In the preceding 34 hours, she had obtained a maximum of 8.5 total hours of sleep. Approximately 3.5 of those hours were obtained as she traveled cross-country in an airplane jumpseat, and those hours were interrupted by her stop in Memphis. She obtained the remaining 5 hours resting in the company crew room. Although the crew room had couches and recliners, it was not isolated and was subject to interruptions, uncontrolled noise and activity, lights, and other factors that prevent quality rest.

Scientific research and accident investigations have demonstrated the negative effects of fatigue on human performance, including reduced alertness and degraded mental and physical performance. Evidence suggests that both pilots were likely experiencing some degree of fatigue at the time of the accident. However, because the errors and decision made by the pilots cannot be solely attributed to fatigue, the NTSB stopped short of making fatigue a causal factor in the accident.

The NTSB continues to look at the many factors that affect a flight crew's ability to achieve adequate rest. Long-distance commuting by pilots is often a necessity because of base transfers that change a pilot's home base to a location that is far from family or is in a high-cost area.

Some commuting pilots rent "crash pads" (shared rooms or apartments) at their base, and some operators provide crew rest facilities so that crews can obtain uninterrupted sleep. Colgan Air did not have a crew rest facility, and the neither of the pilots of Flight 3407 had a crash pad. Colgan Air's commuting policy addressed their pilots' responsibility to arrive at their base and report for duty on time, but the policy did not reference ways to mitigate fatigue resulting from commuting.

As a result of this accident investigation, the NTSB recommended that the FAA require all Part 121, 135, and 91K operators to address fatigue risks associated with commuting, including identifying the number of pilots who commute, establishing policy and guidance to mitigate fatigue risks for commuting pilots, using scheduling practices to minimize opportunities for fatigue in commuting pilots, and developing or identifying rest facilities for commuting pilots. Unfortunately, in the aviation industry, fatigue-related decisions by operators and pilots -- such as minimum crew hires, flight crew schedules and commuting - are decisions that too often reflect the economics of the industry, rather than the data and science of fatigue and human performance.

The issues of pilot proficiency and human fatigue are among the NTSB's most critical areas of concern in the safety of aviation. Last week, the NTSB updated its 2010 Most Wanted List to better emphasize these two safety concerns

Meanwhile, the Safety Board on May 17-19, 2010, will hold a public forum on Ensuring and Supporting High Standards in Flight Crew and Air Traffic Controller Performance. The forum will bring industry leaders together to discuss the selection of pilots and controllers, training methods, and the development of techniques that support safe practices, such as peer mentoring and support, voluntary reporting programs, and the use of technology in oversight.

Later this fall, the NTSB will hold a public symposium on Airline Code-Sharing Arrangements and Their Role in Aviation Safety. The symposium will provide background information on domestic and international code-sharing arrangements and their oversight, and provide insight into the best practices regarding the role of major airlines in ensuring the safety of regional code-sharing partners.