Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Jun;31(3):e13521.
doi: 10.1111/jsr.13521. Epub 2021 Dec 2.

Early starts and late finishes both reduce alertness and performance among short-haul airline pilots

Lucia Arsintescu  1 , Sean Pradhan  1   2 , Ravi G Chachad  1 , Kevin B Gregory  3 , Jeffrey B Mulligan  4 , Erin E Flynn-Evans  3
Affiliations

Early starts and late finishes both reduce alertness and performance among short-haul airline pilots

Lucia Arsintescu et al. J Sleep Res. 2022 Jun.

Abstract

Flight crews are frequently required to work irregular schedules and, as a result, can experience sleep deficiency and fatigue. This study was conducted to determine whether perceived fatigue levels and objective performance varied by time of day, time awake, and prior night's sleep duration. Ninety-five pilots (86 male, 9 female) aged 33 years (±8) volunteered for the study. Participants completed a daily sleep diary, Samn-Perelli fatigue scale, and psychomotor vigilance task that were completed before and after each flight duty period and at the top-of-descent for each flight. Pilots experienced higher self-reported fatigue (EMM = 3.92, SE = 0.09, p < 0.001) and worse performance (Response speed: EMM = 4.27, SE = 0.08, p = 0.004) for late-finishing duties compared with early-starting duties (Samn-Perelli: EMM = 3.74, SE = 0.08; Response speed: EMM = 4.37, SE = 0.08), but had shorter sleep before early-starting duties (early: EMM = 6.94, SE = 0.10; late: EMM = 8.47, SE = 0.14, p < 0.001). However, pre-duty Samn-Perelli and response speed were worse (z = 4.18, p < 0.001; z = 3.05, p = 0.03; respectively) for early starts compared with late finishes (EMM = 2.74, SE = 0.19), while post-duty Samn-Perelli was worse for late finishes (EMM = 4.74, SE = 0.19) compared with early starts (EMM = 4.05, SE = 0.12). The results confirm that duty time has a strong influence on self-reported fatigue and performance. Thus, all flights that encroach on a biological night are targets for fatigue risk management oversight.

Keywords: aviation, crew, duty limits, fatigue, short-haul.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

No conflict of interest has been declared by the authors.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Estimated marginal mean Samn‐Perelli fatigue across duty (grey bars + 95% CI; top panel), response speed (grey bars + 95% CI; middle panel), and lapses (grey bars + 95% CI; bottom panel) plotted as a function of duty start time (05:00–06:59 h [early morning]; 07:00–10:59 h [mid‐morning]; 13:00–16:59 h [afternoon]; 17:00–20:59 h [evening]). Estimated marginal means are reported to adjust for other model terms. Top panel secondary vertical axis (right): Sleep period time (sleep duration) in the previous night = open squares; Time awake at duty start = open circles; ms, milliseconds; h, hours; *p < 0.05, ***p < 0.001
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Estimated marginal mean Samn‐Perelli fatigue across duty (grey bars + 95% CI; top panel), Response speed (grey bars + 95% CI; middle panel), and lapses (grey bars + 95% CI; bottom panel) for early‐start and late‐finishing FDPs. Top panel secondary vertical axis (right): Sleep period time (sleep duration) in the previous night = open squares; Time awake at duty start = open circles; ms, milliseconds; h, hours; **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Estimated marginal mean Samn‐Perelli fatigue by pre‐duty, in‐flight, and post‐duty (95% CI; top panel), Response speed (95% CI; middle panel), and lapses (95% CI; bottom panel) for early‐start and late‐finishing FDPs. ms, milliseconds; *p < 0.05, ***p < 0.001
FIGURE 4
FIGURE 4
Mean Samn‐Perelli by time of day (open circles + 95% CI; top panel), Response speed (open diamonds + 95% CI; middle panel), and lapses (open squares + 95% CI; bottom panel). ms, milliseconds; h, hours; ***p < 0.001
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. Åkerstedt, T. , Klemets, T. , Karlsson, D. , Häbel, H. , Widman, L. , & Sallinen, M. (2021). Acute and cumulative effects of scheduling on aircrew fatigue in ultra‐short‐haul operations. Journal of Sleep Research, 30(5), e13305. 10.1111/jsr.13305 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Arendt, J. (2010). Shift work: Coping with the biological clock. Occupational Medicine, 60(1), 10–20. 10.1093/occmed/kqp162 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Arsintescu, L. , Mulligan, J.B. , & Flynn‐Evans, E.E. (2017). Evaluation of a psychomotor vigilance task for touch screen devices. Human Factors, 59(4), 661–670. 10.1177/0018720816688394 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Bakdash, J.Z. , & Marusich, L.R. (2017). Repeated measures correlation. Frontiers in Psychology, 8, 456. 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00456 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Bates, D. , Maechler, M. , Bolker, B. , Walker, S. , Christensen, R.H.B. , Singmann, H. , Fox, J. (2019). lme4: Linear mixed‐effects models using ‘eigen’ and S4. R package version 1.1‐21.

Publication types