Why do pilots still go to bathroom without having flight attendant in the cockpit?
Hi. I thought a flight attendant should go into the cockpit when one of the pilots go to the bathroom because of what the German wing first officer pilot did to the airbus plane.
But I was surprised when I saw an Air France A318 pilot getting out of the cockpit and going to the bathroom without having a second person in the cockpit when I was traveling from Paris to Geneva two months ago. Isn't it very dangerous? I thought the rules were changed after that German wings incident?
Wasn't there a co-pilot?
Only a few countries introduced those regulations after the Germanwings Flight 9525 crash.
France was not one of those countries, so it's up to the individual airlines to decide whether they want to implement such a rule - apparently Air France have chosen not to.
They trust their copilots.
Maybe the plane can fly itself and he might not be gone for long
The military bathroom technology was incorporated in the pilot flying suit that has been put in U-2 for military use… This piece of technology could be the upgraded version of SR-71 pilot flying suit manufactured by the David Clark Company; Technology by Lockheed Skunk Works and NASA.
The reason is because having more traffic go into and out of the cockpit creates additional hazards, so it just replaces one risk with at least two others. If you unlock and open the cockpit door every time a crew member needs to use the lav, you increase the risk of a hijacking, or a mentally unstable passenger to enter the cockpit. Those two risks combined are significantly greater than the risk of a professionally trained, carefully selected pilot losing their marbles. It is also why the "rule" has been scrapped, and never became official at Germanwings or any other airline I know about.
Different airlines use different protocols for the pilot taking a leak. Some 22 year old girl being in the cockpit isn't going to stop a pilot crashing the plane.
There's never only one pilot on a flight. If they need to go they take turns. A flight attendant
is not a pilot. They take care of the passengers.
The idea is that having a second person on the flight deck enables that person to open the door from the inside, so the other pilot is not locked out, as happened with Germanwings. That person does not have to be a pilot, it can be anyone who is able to unlock a door. Some operators have adopted that policy, others have not.
Cool
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