Airport standby
Standby served at the airport in uniform, ready to board within minutes; counts in full as duty under EASA.
Definition
Airport standby is standby performed at the airport crew room, in uniform, with your bag, so that you can replace a sick or delayed crew member almost immediately. Under EASA the whole period counts as duty time, and if you are called out the FDP that follows is measured from when you reported for the standby, not from the call, so a long airport standby followed by a flight can hit the FDP ceiling quickly. Airlines roster it in blocks of a few hours, usually around the morning and evening departure waves.
What it means for you
It is the most tiring form of standby because you are awake, dressed and at the airport whether you fly or not, and the day counts against your cumulative hours. The compensation is that the legal clock protects you: crewing cannot add a long duty on top of a long airport standby. Bring food, charge your devices and expect to be used on the first wave.
In practice
A Turkish Airlines crew member rostered airport standby from 05:00 at Istanbul is called at 06:10 for a Frankfurt rotation; their FDP started at 05:00, and the day's legal maximum is measured from there.
Go deeper
Related terms
4 terms- StandbyRoster & schedulingA rostered period in which you are not assigned a flight but must be available to be called for one, at the airport or at home.
- Home standbyRoster & schedulingStandby served away from the airport, usually at home, with a contractual call-out time to report — typically 90 minutes to two hours.
- Flight duty periodRoster & schedulingThe regulated window from report for a flying duty to engines off after the last sector; the core limit protecting crew from fatigue.
- Crew controlRoles & ranksThe department that manages crew on the day of operation — calling out standbys, reassigning trips and keeping every flight legally crewed.