In a just released report, there was terror over the skies of Canada early last year that turned out to be one great big hallucination.
A sleepy Air Canada captain en route from Toronto to Switzerland had just awakened from a late night nap, when he noticed another aircraft on a direct collision course with the jetliner he was piloting. Realizing that his entire aircraft was in imminent danger, the drowsy pilot sent the Boeing 767 into an immediate and steep nose dive so as to avert an in-air collision so as to save the lives of all who were on board. Except the image he assumed was a plane in his flight path, was actually just the planet Venus, which of course posed no risk whatsoever to the plane or its passengers.
“Under the effects of significant sleep inertia (when performance and situational awareness are degraded immediately after waking up), the first officer perceived the oncoming aircraft as being on a collision course and began a descent to avoid it,” Canada’s Transportation Safety Board said. “This occurrence underscores the challenge of managing fatigue on the flight deck,” said chief investigator Jon Lee.
The plane, which carried 95 passengers and 8 crew members, dropped about 400 feet before the captain pulled back on the control column. 14 passengers and 2 crew members were injured, and 7 required hospital treatment. None were wearing seat belts at the time, despite the seat-belt sign being on.
According to the newly released report, the pilot napped for 75 minutes rather than the 40 minute maximum required by airline regulations. This meant he fell into a deep sleep and was disoriented when he woke up, which caused him to basically hallucinate behind the controls of a powerful jetliner thousands of feet in the air.
The report is yet another problem for Canada’s largest airline, which has faced prolonged labor unrest. It is also a testament to the deprivation of sleep many pilots from around the world experience prior to operating an airplane.
