Investigators are trying to figure out how it hap­pened that a com­mer­cial flight car­ry­ing 144 obliv­i­ous pas­sen­gers simply sped past its des­ti­na­tion last night––by 150 miles. Not only did the pilots miss their land­ing strip, they missed every attempt by ground con­trollers to con­tact them over the course of an entire hour. The excuse the pilots gave, after cir­cling back and land­ing safely but a little later than expected, is not very reas­sur­ing (from the Times.)

the pilots told the Fed­eral Bureau of Investigation and the air­port police that “they were in a heated dis­cus­sion over air­line policy and they lost sit­u­a­tional aware­ness,” the safety board said, citing infor­ma­tion from the Fed­eral Avi­a­tion Administration.

The good news is that the pilots even­tu­ally got their sit­u­a­tional aware­ness back!

So, just two screw-​ups, right? When you think about it, the num­bers don’t sug­gest that it’s very likely that your aver­age cit­i­zen will end up on a flight with fel­lows like these. I know that I don’t really like the idea of soar­ing over Iowa, hap­pily unaware among the dim lamps, my People mag­a­zine in hand, as pilots drowse at the con­trols. But it just won’t happen! What are the chances!  Besides, for every total moron that man­ages to pass his/her flight tests, there’s another Sully in the wings. 

Right? 

On the other hand, there’s this:

Keith Hol­loway, a spokesman for the safety board, said he did not know if it was pos­si­ble the two pilots had fallen asleep.

In Feb­ru­ary 2008, a Go! Air­lines flight over­shot Hilo Inter­na­tional Air­port out­side Hon­olulu by 30 miles, and the pilots later acknowl­edged that they had both fallen asleep.

Fatigue has long been an impor­tant issue for the Air Line Pilots Asso­ci­a­tion, which rep­re­sents pilots at North­west and Delta. For years, the asso­ci­a­tion has said that pilots are flying right up to the manda­tory limits set by the F.A.A., and that indus­try cut­backs have required them to fly more hours with less rest.

“Sixteen-​hour domestic-​duty days — and longer in inter­na­tional flying — are a fact of life for pilots,” John Prater, the union’s pres­i­dent, said in tes­ti­mony before Con­gress ear­lier this year. “Irreg­u­lar shifts, mul­ti­ple time zones, all-night oper­a­tions and dis­rupted cir­ca­dian rhythms all con­tribute to pilot fatigue.”

Reg­u­la­tions call for an eight-​hour rest period, but that includes travel to and from hotels where pilots stay. “Pilots often cannot get time — or decom­press enough — to receive more than five or six hours of sleep,” Mr. Prater said.