Fatigue in Aviation

     Fatigue is one of the biggest contributing factors for human errors in the aviation industry that falls under the "Dirty Dozen" category identified by the FAA as 12 of the highest causes for human error (SKYbrary, n.d.).  Fatigue can be caused by long work hours or working irregular hours. Many airlines have redeye flights which operate at nighttime. This can create a disturbance for a pilot's sleep routine which may lead to fatigue due to sleep loss. The constant change in shifts may also create an irregular sleep schedule that would lead to fatigue as well. 

    Fatigue has caused many major incidents or accidents in the past at around 20% of these accidents being due to fatigue per the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). The impact of fatigue is that it can negatively impact a person's ability to react quickly and properly in an emergency. Sometimes situations may come up during the flight but due to a pilot's inability to properly think, they may make the wrong decision which can lead to an aircraft accident in the worst-case scenario. Fatigue may also cause impaired alertness which causes pilots to microsleep while flying which has decreased their alertness to what is going on in the cockpit (Wingelaar-Jagt, Y. Q., Wingelaar, T. T., Riedel, W. J., & Ramaekers, J. G., 2021). Fatigue poses a threat to the aviation industry as it can increase the risk of aircraft incidents or accidents. 

References: 

National Transportation Safety Board. (n.d.). Reduce fatigue-related accidents. Reduce Fatigue-Related Accidents. https://www.ntsb.gov/Advocacy/mwl/Pages/mwl1-2016.aspx 

SKYbrary. (n.d.). The human factors “dirty Dozen.” The Human Factors “Dirty Dozen” | SKYbrary Aviation Safety. https://skybrary.aero/articles/human-factors-dirty-dozen

Wingelaar-Jagt, Y. Q., Wingelaar, T. T., Riedel, W. J., & Ramaekers, J. G. (2021, September 6). Fatigue in aviation: Safety Risks, preventive strategies and pharmacological interventions. Frontiers in physiology. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8451537/

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