News JAL struggling with pilot drinking problem

Japan Airlines, again, is in hot water after a series of incidents in which pilots were found to have been drinking alcohol before flights, despite rules imposed by the flag carrier prohibiting such behaviour. In the latest incident on 28 August, a pilot failed an alcohol screening before a flight departing from Hawaii. He drank three bottles of 9.5% alcohol beer the previous day. The pilot has since been dismissed, and all executives have been punished with pay cuts. This comes after JAL in December last year banned flight captains from drinking alcohol at their destination.

The August incident delayed the flight connecting Honolulu to Chubu airport near Nagoya, Japan. Two other flights were temporarily grounded as well. The captain was found to have consumed alcohol before flights roughly 10 times after the December prohibition was put in place. He had also tampered with the date and time settings of the sobriety testing device. In May last year, Japan's transport ministry reprimanded JAL for an incident in which another pilot and crew members drank at a hotel in Dallas, Texas. In December, a flight was delayed in Australia due to excess drinking by the pilot and copilot.

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Paywall alert:


JAL announced on Wednesday that it will cut the pay of President Tottori Mitsuko and 36 other executives following a scandal involving a captain who drank heavily in Hawaii before reporting for duty. The airline said the 64-year-old captain was dismissed on 11 September as a disciplinary measure. Tottori will see her monthly salary reduced by 30% for two months. Managing Executive Officer Yukio Nakagawa, who also serves as chief safety officer, and Masaki Minami, head of flight operations, will each take a 20% cut for one month. The other 34 executives will face a 10% reduction for one month.



The airline is now requiring its pilots to give a written pledge that they will not drink before flights. Sources say the company has sent out an electronic pledge form to all pilots. The document calls on them to follow the airline's internal rules on alcohol use and includes a statement reading, "I will not cause any incidents related to alcohol." Pilots must check the box next to the statement, with "Yes" being the only option available.

Like me, the probably fly better after a few drinks

Good movie: Flight (2012 film) - Wikipedia

A couple years back, before one flight from the US back here, I saw the crew at the gate doing sobriety testing--some kind of breath testing tube attached to iPads/tablets.

We flew as scheduled, so I guess they all passed. (Zipair)

They should have those breathalyser ignitions in the cockpit; if you don't pass, you can't turn the engine over!

Ukigumo said:

They should have those breathalyser ignitions in the cockpit; if you don't pass, you can't turn the engine over!

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Not the cockpit, but that's what this zip crew did--breath testing of the whole crew just before boarding, just before they got on the plane. And they did this in the presence of each other.

If the tablets themselves were not connected to some overview system, I'll guess that they had to confirm each other's results and somehow sign off as having observed others take--and pass--the test. Maybe both of those aspects were being used (a failsafe process).