Japan Airlines (JAL) disclosed that the captain scheduled to operate Flight JL793 from Honolulu to Nagoya/Chubu (Japan) on August 28 (Boeing 787-9, registration JA874J) had been drinking during his layover.
The captain detected alcohol on a voluntary test conducted before leaving his hotel. He voluntarily reported to the company that alcohol was detected on the voluntary test and that he had consumed alcohol the previous day. As this violated internal rules, the company removed him from duty.
Around midday on the day before departure, the captain drank alone in his hotel room, in violation of company rules: three beers (9.5% ABV, 568 milliliters each). A subsequent investigation concluded that he exceeded the limit set in the operating regulations, which restricts alcohol consumption that would leave residual alcohol of the equivalent of four or more drinks 12 hours before report time.
It was also found that on multiple previous occasions the captain had consumed alcohol while on layovers and had altered the date and time on an alcohol detector to conceal that fact. On none of those flights was alcohol detected during formal tests.
As a result, the flight, carrying 12 crew members and 239 passengers for a total of 251 people, departed 2 hours 8 minutes late at 4:28 p.m. that day, and arrived at Nagoya/Chubu 1 hour 43 minutes behind schedule at 7:13 p.m. the following day (August 29). Securing replacement crew took time, causing two flights to be delayed.
JAL commented: “We take very seriously not only the violation of our operating regulations in this case, but also the breach of our commitment to society by violating the no-alcohol policy during layovers—an immediate measure instituted following the Melbourne case in December last year. The captain in question will face strict disciplinary action. We will continue to promptly strengthen our measures to prevent recurrence.” Further details will be explained at a press conference.
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This article was generated using automatic translation by GPT-4 API. The translation may not be accurate.
