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Fatigue Fast Plot From V911 Amtc Issue


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After researching the fatigue article in the recent AMTC issue of Vertical 911, the folks who created the FAST program, or Fatigue Avoidance Scheduling Tool aggreed to allow me to use the system for Vertical's safety forum.

 

If you like, post your duty schedule, I'll run it through the FAST program, and post the plot so you can view what the FAST program produces.

 

It's a great program, easy to use, and really helps out in fatigue and duty rotation analysis. FAST is 90% accurate.

 

 

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The attached file is a graphic representation of a work schedule. It's really intuitive, quick and easy to plot. You can also take into account geographical postion, time of month, chaning time zones etc. It's pretty impressive. The location is important, as the program knows your location and will know when it's light and dark, which affects your human bio-rythms.

 

The blue area is sleep, the red, work, and white area neither work or sleep.

 

The next plots are the FAST plot of performance, from the work shedule.

 

Not the drop in performance as the worker goes from day to night...

post-4477-1225364548_thumb.jpg

post-4477-1225365299_thumb.jpg

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Brent,

 

I work for an agency that recently changed schedules and I would like see what the FAST plot looks like for both schedules. I have worked each schedule for at least 5 years and I know what my body tells me but I would like to see what FAST says. The first schedule is a simple 24 on 72 off with a 2 hour rest period from 1400 to 1600 and crew rest encouraged after 2300. Crew rest periods are mission dependent and shifts start at 0700. The second schedule is a 12 hr shift rotation which rotates from day only to night only each month. Following is an example of days worked over a 4 week period.

WK 1 M,T,F,S,Su

WK 2 W,Th

WK 3 M,T,F,S,Su

WK 4 W,Th

On Schedule 2, rest is encouraged only on night schedule after 3:00 am, mission dependent.

 

Some things that cannot be factored into to comparisons between schedules like this is the ability to maintain regular meal schedules on schedule 1 vs meal changes every month on schedule two. Recovery times after shifts also affects time off and related activities. Commute times between the two schedules is significant. With schedule 2 the commute time doubles, this eats into rest/off time and there are several other factors that can never be quantified. Quality time off, however must be factored into the big picture as it is important for mental and physical well being.

 

 

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Copter Jim, i'm sorry to say, but I ran your program through the computer, went to eat dinner, came back and now my computer's hard drive no longer wants to cooporate, and it's fried.

 

From looking at the schedule, it's a no brainer the 24 hour schedule is better for fatigue... the only thing you didn't add in there was the amount of sleep after you 3am on the 12 hour shifts and on the 24 hr shifts how much sleep you get after 2300...

 

For the 12 hour shift, i put in a 3 hour nap from 0300-0600 and that helped tremendously with fatigue, leaving it in the yellow seciton. But without that fatigue countermeasure, the performance for the night shift was very, very low, in the red.

 

Well, i'm in the market for new computer anyhow, hopefully I will revisit this forum in a week or so, and get back up and running with FAST for another week. It's reallly a great program, and I was looking forward to posting the results and I was interested in what other outfits were doing with respect to their schedules....

 

In the end, judging from FAST and personal experience, a 12 hour shift from 1900-0700 without sleep is definately a hazard of the job. Use the fatigue countermeasures to help you maintain wakefullness.

 

Thanks for the interest,

 

Brent

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