subject: Do Pilots Sometimes Sleep While In The Cockpit? [print this page] You may not think that pilots ever take naps while in the cockpit and you know, actually flying the plane and everything, but you'd be surprised how often this does happen. Pilots don't sleep do long while on the plane but they do take brief naps on occasion.
With two pilots in the cockpit at all times, flights from Denver to Seattle could sometimes be flown by only one pilot while the other takes a brief nap. It's not surprising that this happens, pilots work busy schedules and need to sometimes take a rest on the particularly gruelling journeys. Pilots will anonymously admit to having taken brief naps on planes, for of course it's not something that is worth for airlines to admit. But sometimes, both pilots will fall asleep as this is where the problems start.
When the plane is on auto-pilot there doesn't need to be anyone controlling it. So recently on a flight in the United States two pilots completely overshot their destination when both allegedly fell asleep. Neither admitted that there was any sleeping that happening, and said that there was instead some sort of technical malfunction. But it could be true in fact that there is indeed some pilots who sleep while on board.
Ryanair however are planning to cut the number of pilots on their flights to only one. You should still expect two pilots on long flights from Los Angeles to Athensand flights from Raleigh to Las Vegas, but on shorter hops, Ryanair are hoping to save money by having only one pilot. They will train one of the cabin crew in how to land the plane in case the pilot is unable to for any reason. It seems like an irresponsible thing to do that could passengers lives in danger, especially is a pilot were to fall asleep.
