Better Living Through Miles says,
Last year, JetBlue conducted experiments on some pilots by bending the rules (with local FAA consent, later recanted). They had their pilots hooked up to monitoring devices and then had them fly 10 to 11 hours a day, more than the legal 8 hours. Passengers were never informed that they were guinea pigs or co-test-pilots.
Link to blog post, which references a Wall Street Journal article locked behind a @$%^@ paywall.
Update: Ben Popken at Consumerist says,
Whole WSJ article reprinted in this post: Link. Too important for people to know about to have it locked behind a paywall.
Update 2: Here's a reg-free link to the article on WSJ.com (Thanks, Carl Bialik of WSJ)
Reader comment: Steve Simitzis says,
This is why choosing an airline with a strong union backing the pilots is so important. This kind of thing just can't happen on Southwest or United, while JetBlue is always trying to push pilots harder and cut corners on maintenance. Pilot unions back up pilots on all safety decisions, for example, if a pilot is too fatigued to fly or if a pilot judges a plane to be poorly maintained. At a non-union airline, a pilot must fly or deal with management.
Here's a list of airlines backed by unions: Link.
American Airlines and Southwest have their own unions, not part of ALPA: Allied Pilots, SWAPA.
