Hawaiian Airlines pilots will lose a long-standing and weird allowance for beards as Alaska Air Group rolls out a mixed pilot uniform and look coverage following the carriers’ merger.
In an inner e-mail dated March 23 seen by AirlineGeeks, Alaska System Chief Pilot Scott Day instructed pilots {that a} “significant” revision to the Flight Operations Manual can be launched on April 1, together with updates to the uniform and look coverage. He stated all Boeing 787 pilots would additionally start transitioning to the Alaska uniform on April 20.
Day additionally flagged what he described as a significant change within the revision, writing: “Going forward, facial hair must meet specific requirements to ensure compliance with FAA guidance and flight deck safety and beards will not be authorized.”
A March 27 follow-up message to Hawaiian pilots from Dave Mets – the corporate’s vp of flight operations – supplied further element on the choice.
In that be aware, Mets acknowledged the importance of the change, writing, “I recognize this is an important issue for many and do not want to be insensitive or vague about it in any way.” He added: “I fully understand that this is a policy decision many of you do not and may never agree with.”
Regulatory Review
Mets stated the corporate had engaged with regulators a number of occasions over a number of years on the problem of beards and oxygen masks use, and stated cockpit oxygen masks producers have really helpful in opposition to beards within the flight deck. He wrote that the FAA’s Civil Aerospace Medical Institute, or CAMI, had not too long ago “reaffirmed its long-standing recommendation that for safety reasons, beards should not be allowed in the flight deck.”
The firm’s resolution comes at the same time as the problem stays contested past U.S. airline coverage circles. The FAA advisory round usually cited in beard-related masks steerage, AC 120-43, dates to 1987 and stays energetic. More latest analysis has pointed in a distinct route.
A 2024 Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University study discovered no proof that facial hair precipitated masks leaks, hypoxia, or chemical publicity points in testing involving commercial-style oxygen masks. Earlier analysis from Simon Fraser University likewise discovered facial hair didn’t compromise masks efficiency in its examine, work the college stated helped assist Air Canada’s transfer to allow pilot beards.
He stated the airline additionally reviewed FAA laws, producer specs, and placards as a part of a security danger evaluation tied to growth of the mixed coverage. According to Mets, that assessment concluded: “our safest and most compliant path forward was to prohibit beards in the flight deck in our combined uniform policy.”
Mets additionally tied the problem to a latest real-world occasion, writing that “our own very recent experience with Alaska Flight 1282 demonstrated the seriousness of this topic as our pilots had to don their O2 masks due to the rapid decompression that occurred.”
The up to date Flight Operations Manual displays that change immediately. The revised look commonplace says a well-groomed mustache stays authorized, however “beards are not allowed.”
The transfer ends a coverage that had made Hawaiian one of many few U.S. airlines to allow pilot beards. The broader subject has remained some extent of debate throughout the trade.
‘Longstanding FAA Guidance’
In a press release to AirlineGeeks, Alaska stated: “Safety is our priority, and Alaska and Hawaiian’s policy to prohibit facial hair for pilots across our combined airline is based on longstanding FAA guidance, as well as our own studies over many years.”
The firm additionally sought to tell apart the beard resolution from broader questions on Hawaiian’s id inside the merged airline.
Mets wrote that Alaska management has “absolutely no desire or intention to diminish the way Hawaiian Airlines and/or Hawaiian culture is celebrated and respected within our combined company,” pointing to continued funding within the Hawaiian model, airport infrastructure, cabin upgrades, and different appearance-policy adjustments, together with a extra relaxed tattoo commonplace.
The Air Line Pilots Association – which represents pilots at each carriers – couldn’t be instantly reached for touch upon the coverage change.
The two pilot teams are nonetheless represented individually inside ALPA and are at the moment negotiating a joint collective bargaining settlement. Under the union merger course of, their seniority lists can be built-in solely after that contract is ratified, with a single pilot group and grasp government council to comply with.
