FAA Moves to Block Flight Attendants and Pilots From Claiming Mandatory Meal Breaks

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is moving to block flight attendants and pilots from claiming mandatory meal breaks under local State laws, such as California’s generous Labor Code, which grants employees who work for more than five hours an uninterrupted 30-minute meal break.

Several U.S. airlines, including American Airlines and Alaska Airlines, have been caught up in legal battles with their flight attendants over these State-level laws, with AA reportedly reaching a $24 million settlement with California-based flight attendants in late 2023 over the issue.

Alaska Airlines even threatened to close crew bases in California over the meal break law, but eventually backtracked when it secured an exemption for aircrews, which was backed by the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA)

The exemption followed years of legal wrangling, which started when Alaska Airlines bought out Virgin America. The airline unsuccessfully argued that federal laws that govern the working conditions of airline staff should trump local State laws, but a California appeals court disagreed.

Alaska Airlines even attempted to appeal the verdict to the Supreme Court, but the justices refused to review the case. In the end, an exemption was only won with the support of the flight attendant union on the proviso that the collective bargaining agreement was used to govern crew member rest breaks.

Similar meal break rules have been introduced in several other states, including Washington, where Alaska Airlines failed to secure a California-style exemption.

Now, however, the FAA has filed a notice of proposed rulemaking that would clarify that State-level meal and rest break laws are preempted by the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, which, in other words, means that these local laws would not apply to flight attendants.

Under the Airline Deregulation Act, states are not allowed to introduce laws that would have a “significant impact on air carrier prices, routes, and services.” The FAA argues that local meal break rules have exactly this effect.

“Recent litigation prompted FAA to review regulations relating to duty and rest for flightcrew members and flight attendants,” the agency explained in its proposed rulemaking.

“While Federal regulations concerning flightcrew members have consistently preempted State action, there have been efforts to apply some State laws to flight attendants,” the NPRM adds. “Conflicting State or local laws would create a complex patchwork of regulatory requirements that would frustrate the Federal regulatory scheme and inhibit aviation safety.”

“To address the inconsistency created by judicial rulings and to ensure a cohesive national safety standard, FAA proposes a rule clarifying that a single, uniform set of requirements applies to the duty, rest, and break periods for both flightcrew members and flight attendants.”

The FAA doesn’t intend to mandate its own set of rules for meal breaks for flight attendants, and instead argues that existing federal laws manage potential fatigue and rest management adequately and that insisting that flight attendants take meal breaks during a flight could compromise safety.

“The primary mission of flight attendants is to ensure safety, a role that is undermined if a flight attendant is legally ‘off-duty’ during an emergency,” the NPRM explains. “Flight attendants need to be ready to manage land and water evacuations, control inflight fires, manage medical emergencies, and handle unruly passengers among other tasks.

“In contrast to these State laws that present safety risk, FAA’s regulations are intended to increase safety through fatigue mitigation, which FAA addresses by regulating rest periods between shifts rather than during them,” the proposed rulemaking continues.

As with any Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, these updated rules won’t come into effect anytime soon. The FAA has opened up the rulemaking to public comment until September, at which time the agency will review the comments and may change the wording or specifics of the NPRM.

From there, the FAA could publish a final rulemaking, which could take many months until it actually comes into force.

Expect the airline industry to applaud and broadly support this move, while some States may challenge the rulemaking. As for flight attendant unions, don’t expect support just because the AFA-CWA worked with Alaska Airlines for an exemption to the California meal break law.

That exemption was only supported because it gave the union leverage to secure meal break provisions for every single Alaska Airlines flight attendant, not just those who are based in California.