CHAPTER 1<br >PREFLIGHT PLANNING<br >PLANNING THE ROUTE， ALTITUDE， AND SPEED<br >An airline is a highly technical labor-intensive， service-<br >oriented business. More than 100 person-hours are spent<br >preparing for every one hour a pilot spends flying.<br > A major airline employs approximately 60，000 people.<br >Of those， 12 percent (or 7500) are pilots; 22 percent (or<br >more than 13，000) are flight attendants; and 7 percent<br >(5500) are mechanics.<br > The other 34，000 employees are equally as vital， but are<br >not always given equal credit. The reservations staff， mar-<br >keting personnel， passenger service agents， crew schedulers，<br >dispatchers， central load planners， cargo and baggage han-<br >dlers， fuel servicemen， cabin service， training instructors，<br >lawyers， secretaries， etc. are all an integral part of a safe and<br > reliable airline. In fact it takes more than 150 employees to<br >operate just one aircraft. The larger airlines operate more<br >than 400 aircraft.<br > A major U.S. domestic airline will schedule roughly 2500<br > flights daily， departing around the clock every day of the<br > year. It doesn t sound all that impressive until you realize<br > that works out to nearly one departure every thirty seconds.<br ><br >