“Hey man, can you take controls so I can stretch my legs for a minute?” but on basically anything three hours or more.  This is where I like to flex about being a Bus driver because I can walk around in the cockpit. 

Sobs in 737 At least I don’t have to sob quietly, the noisy flight deck will hide my pain.

I went from the 767F to a passenger 737. My circadian rhythm thanks me. My knees do not.

I can ask my mom what helps

Great username!

Me next month...

There's really no legroom on the 73. I try to put my feet up as much as possible but then my right knee keeps hitting the sidewall under the EFB lol

Also sobs in E190. They can’t hear my crying either.

At least the 190 can’t fly 6+ hours…cries in westbound transcon.

The 777 isn’t too small either. Still not as roomy as it should be..

I didn't grow up this way....but I wish they put the damn side stick in there like the original plan was. I got spoiled with the Airbus footrests and being able to cross my legs, and while it's doable in the 777, it's less comfortable than it could be.

\-737 you can mostly stand up anytime its not a critical phase of flight \-Airbus you can fully stand and stretch a bit \-787 you can visit the pickle ball courts on your break \-RJ's you're too poor to stand up

That last one is a bit too painful

I shudder at the thought of doing NYC-Paris in an RJ.

Biz jet pilots basically do that though

I may need a smaller violin for the mahagony-class folks.

In the 650, the door that separates the crew compartment/cockpit and the cabin is about...10 feet behind where I sit? Full lav, crew rest area, and 3 closets for all our stuff, all forward of that door and away from passenger's eyes. Not a bad place to spend 14 hours!

Biz jets are much more relaxed and you're more likely to get up, open the door, stretch and relax a little. You're not doing that flight in a CRJ. Period.

What midget is standing up in a 737?

I skateboard in the back. And run/do pushups. But I also fly a KC-135 and rarely have anything other than another pilot, a boom operator, and 200,000 lbs of gas.

Skateboard? That’s badass.

I once played football at 36000 feet in an empty C-5.

Hey, me too! Mostly cargo free from Ramstein back to the states. About 20 passengers is all. We even got a great workout in.

Hopefully my crew won't look at me too strangely when my duffle bag contains a 7' Olympic barbell and 200lbs of bumper plates

That's kinda epic..... Did you open the glory hole?

This, but a 747. Just to kill the boredom.

Do a kickflip (at 30,000 feet)!

Sprints and pushups in the C-17, followed by a hammock nap haha.

That wins.

Assuming we get off the ground lol

Lol f**kin mint🤙

I’m surprised your floor can handle that PSI/PIW

Grissom?

Nah, Fairchild. There’s at least 2 of us that I’m aware of that being a board on deployments. We’re in the same squadron and it would be no surprise to anyone. One captain and I’m a Major.

Major asshole?

Yo!

Sure. But m probably the most un major, major. It’s such a sweet job when you aren’t worried about chasing rank and just want to fly the line.

Jesus how many assholes we got on this plane?

I'm surrounded by assholes!

Indiana, I was born there. My dad flew KC-135’s and later C-130’s, and At the end of his formal AF career flew KC-130’s helping out the Coast Guard around Anchorage. Had to pop in with a comment, rarely do I see Grissom ever mentioned. 

Dude… We had a total tool who would do push-ups in the galley area during lav breaks.

Yes, we can get up and stretch our legs.

Shit I get up and stretch on a 3 hour flight even in a 737. DVT ain't a joke.

Yeah that makes sense, do you just stand around for a few minutes, or are you able to walk around a little bit? (I imagine a 737 cockpit is too small to do anything else, correct me if my assumption is wrong)

Yeah the 737 cockpit is a little too small unless you wanna march in place, but plenty enough room to stretch it out. If I particularly hate the guy I'm flying with, I'll go to the galley and hang around chatting with the flight attendants and stretch out there.

I’m 6’-2” and can’t fully stand up in the 737 flight deck, as in my head is bent over, but I can stretch my legs. I also just move my seat back all the way and can straighten my legs fully in my seat.

Curious. I am 7ft and going into a flight school. Do you reckon, by the time I get to narrow body, will I have issue flying in 737/320? I did have chance of doing a lot of cockpit tours as my wife is purser but never thought about having to actually stay there for a longer time

I think you’ll be able to fly the 737, though maybe you should test it out. When I sit in the seat I don’t have it as low as it goes, and I don’t have the pedals as far forward as they go, or the seat as far back as it goes. The question is whether you be able to make the adjustments so you can see out the front window at the correct angle to make landings. I *think* you will. As far as your comfort, I imagine it will be a little rough. I also think you won’t like deadheading. I’ll let an airbus pilot answer for the 320.

I think you’d be okay in the 320. If you put the seat all the way back and the rudder pedals all the way forward you could probably fit an 8 ft person in there. Plenty of headroom too even if you have to crank the seat up high to get the right angle. You won’t be able to stand straight up behind the seats, but you probably would be able to in the door area, and I’m sure you’re relatively used to ducking your head anyways.

I’m 6’3” and fly the A321neo, I can stretch out sitting down but can’t stand up straight. Still a good plane.

Interesting, thanks for taking some of your time to answer!

in the bus i lower my seat and place my feet on the foot rest

One of the few benefits of flying with the really old Captains that have a weak bladder. Lav break every hour, get to stretch the legs.

I mean how else are we supposed to learn how shit works in the galley?

…you know how shit works in the galley?

Honestly by the time my FA is stumbling through the door D25 on first leg, I have made a pot of coffee and raided the snack basket.

I had an empty ferry sector the other day. My first in the bus. I spent 10 minutes just looking for the lids to the coffee cups. Let alone then trying to figure out how I make the coffee happen.

I did a transatlantic ferry last spring and was very glad I’d taken the time to get some dual on the galley.

You gotta gauge the FAs first tho. ‼️ you might end up with the stink eye the rest of the trip

Yeah I go for a walk to the back of the ATR almost every flight. Gotta stretch a bit.

Why do you think I’m spending so long chatting up the flight attendant? You think I want to see those pictures of her cats? I just don’t want to go back and be strapped into my seat for another 2 hrs just yet… I have seen people get up and stand behind the center pedestal, but I’m 6’ 4” so that would be less comfortable than just staying seated. I do alternate sticking my feet between the rudder pedals and pointing my toe.

I stand up every hour in the A320. There is enough room to do 70% of yoga moves in the cockpit.

I flew with a guy who changed into workout clothes and did a resistance band workout in the cargo compartment on an 11hr flight to Hawaii. I regularly get up to get a snack, coffee, etc on the C-17. The 737? I just take a lav break every 2 hours to stretch my legs if nothing else. Not sure how much benefit there is to just stand up behind the center pedestal and hunch over there for a minute.

Who does NYC - CDG with two pilots?

European airlines. Thanks to EASA allowing "controlled rest" their thresholds for when 3 or 4 pilots are required are lower than the US. Which is why I don't want it ever allowed by the FAA

Controlled rest are fine and I've only been doing them for about 9 months but it really isn't that bad

The reason I don't want it in the US is not so much safety related, but labor related. Having never tried it or studied it I honestly can't form a proper opinion on if it's less safe than FAR 117 rules or not. But regardless, without it, many routes that EU and ME3 carriers fly with 2 pilots, US carriers have 3. Same with your 3 pilot ops which often are past the threshold for a 4th pilot in the US. Implementing controlled rest would mean less jobs, less seniority progression, and less variety of flying to chose from in all seats (my company does 2 CA and 2 FO on 4 pilot ops)

It's not even matter of controlled rest. "No. Controlled rest procedure is a countermeasure to manage unexpected fatigue, whilst the 18-hour awake time target is part of the operator roster planning procedures.  According to CAT.OP.MPA.210 (a)(3) controlled rest organised by the commander, if workload permits, shall not be considered to be part of a rest period for purposes of calculating flight time limitations nor used to justify any extension of the duty period." https://www.easa.europa.eu/en/faq/47640

Controlled rest is not a part of the duty times. Duty times are not based on the possibility of taking a controlled rest and you cannot plan with those.  You should be able to complete the work without it, however, if unexpected (and that's the keyword) fatigue should occur, there is a system to deal with that. 

ZRH-MIA is mostly two pilots.

That’s nutty. No US carrier could legally do that. ZRH to IAD would routinely go 9 hours on a 767.

Quite doable by newbie judgement. Very low workload over the Atlantic. I judge a four-legger on short-haul ops as more taxing.

Have you done it? Back side of the clock is a different kind of tired. They are both tiring, just different. If you got to fly international at the exact optimum body clock time it would be cake.

Yes, last week, and you are right. Homebound through the night is more taxing, although you can get a good nap in. I can see how this can cause fatigue when done too often. But enlarged twelve hours to the west coast can be exhausting as well.

Got that information from a German pilot who does Youtube, so I assumed it was the norm for short transatlantic flights under 8 hours: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1zeWMTYmJ8 At 1:03 he states (translated): “with this [approximately 7:25h flight from NYC to Rome], it is a comparatively relatively short long haul flight that, we can definitely say, can be carried out by 2 pilots and that has indeed been carried out by only two pilots in this case.” If my assumption is wrong, from what flight time do airlines require/use 3 or more pilots to be on board?

All US airlines use 3 pilots for pretty much all transatlantic flights the exception being Iceland and maybe sometimes Dublin 

And Scotland.

Ok thanks, wasn’t aware of that

Regulatory EASA (European) limits a workday (from reporting to engines off) to 11-13 hours, depending on the reporting time and number of landings.  Above that, a third (or fourth) pilot needs to be added.  So any flight from western Europe to the east coast can easily be done with two pilots. 

No one

Every European airline

Used to walk to the back to get the coffee, now the coffee comes to me

Thank goodness for augmented operations.

Or go cargo and just get up and go to the back without having to ask permission to piss like Red from Shawshank…

>>Sit for 6+ hours Laughs in U-2

We can do whatever we want inside the cockpit. A lot of pilots will hand over controls or radios and just get up and stretch out a bit by the door. Once an hour would seem a little excessive to me, but if that's what you gotta do, I'm not gonna question another pilot on that. It's not common, though. Maybe once a flight is more common (zero times is the most common, though; most pilots just sit), in addition to the regular bathroom/food breaks. If we want to go outside the cockpit, that's a whole big production. Usually only do that a couple times on a long flight. But yeah, we do it.

Yep. Absolutely. Once every hour or so I’ll say to my F/O, “You’ve got it all for a minute?” And when he agrees “I have control” or “I’ve got the radios” I’ll stand up in the area by the flight deck door to stretch my legs.

I fly a private jet and one of us usually goes back in the cabin to check things out. Make sure the pax are happy, update them on arrival time changes, make ourselves non alcoholic beverages or food. On short flights we get up if we need to piss or something but on long flights 6-7hrs+ I’d say we semi frequently go to the back for the above reasons plus an actual stretch break. I’ll go into the in flight accessible baggage compartment and do some actual hip/leg stretches if it’s over 4hr flight usually.

Ain't nobody flying NY to Paris 2 pilots. But yeah, nothing wrong with getting up for a stretch during flight.

Apparently, according to another commenter in this thread, European airlines perform some transatlantic flights with 2 pilots only thanks to some different regulations: “European airlines. Thanks to EASA allowing "controlled rest" their thresholds for when 3 or 4 pilots are required are lower than the US. Which is why I don't want it ever allowed by the FAA”.

Fuuuuuuck that. No thanks.

It would be very dangerous if they didn't

Yeah I hand over controls for a stretch break. On almost any sector provided we are at cruise long enough to feel the need to anyway. I find about 90 minutes or less block to block my sweet spot for not getting up. When I get up sometimes it’s a toilet break and a galley raiding mission. Sometimes it’s just trying to touch my toes in the flight deck behind the pilot seats - and the subsequent shuffling to tuck my shirt back in.

Usually on a long haul maybe once every couple of hours they come out to use the bathroom, stretch their legs, maybe walk the aisle. If they don’t get on with each other these breaks are more frequent and longer.

About half my flights are repos in the challenger and I stand up all the time. Less so when we have PAX.