are pilots checking the fuel level during flight?

[EB-Air]

Hello,

Yesterday I was watching ‘Holiday Airline’ on TV1, and saw the flight of an Monarch A330 from the UK to Florida. The pilots asked for FL 380, but ATC assigned them to FL 280, due to the morning traffic coming from the US. The pilots were concerned about the fuel consumption at that flight level, and where thinking about adding an additional stop to refuel. Above Canada, they finally received FL 390. After landing in Florida, they checked the fuel left, and were surprised about the amount left: they had burned less fuel than expected…

So my question: was that scene after the landing (the surprised pilots) played just for the camera’s, or was it for real? I thought that pilots during long flights were checking their fuel reserve at certain waypoints, and calculate the fuel burning to verify if they need to divert and that everything is running smooth during that flight… That’s how I’ve learned it in the documentary on National Geographic about the Air Transat A330 that lost power on both engines due to a fuel leak and made an succesful gliding and emergency landing at the Azores…

What are your thoughts?

Regards,
Ben

[Fab99]

Can you imagine yourself driving to South of France and running out of fuel somewhere on the highway??? Of course not!!!
Knowing they burned less fuel on the way in (by comparing the actual burn versus their flight plan), they might be concerned about burning more coming back.

[Captain]

That’s how I’ve learned it in the documentary on National Geographic about the Air Transat A330 that lost power on both engines due to a fuel leak and made an succesful gliding and emergency landing at the Azores…

Fuel tanks levels are frequently checked by pilots as it's one of the most important things they regularly check. I did also see that documentatry of Air Transat, carzy they managed to land safely after having run out of fuel for about 80 miles (nautical I think). That was the longest distance completed by a plane after running out of fuel.

Captain

[744rules]

Fuellevels are checked regulary by flightcrew, especially when their actual situation differs a lot from the plannned situation.

A fuelload is (mainly) based on the ZFW (zero fuel weight= a/c + load+crew) and will also being affected by things as flightlevel, windfactor, .....

That's why on a flightplan, the crew can see the changes in fuelburn and/or flighttime for a difference in zfw.

In the case of the Monarch, they got fl280 iso fl380. The crew knew the burn would increase and upon arrival they were surprised the fuelburn-increase was not so high as expected, but in the end they burned more than planned.


Hope this helps