B737 Next Generation Undifferentiated
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Fatigue; Situational Awareness
Conflict Ground Conflict; Less Severe; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
Flight Crew Became Reoriented
Human Factors
On day six of two back-to-back three day pairings; we landed at LAX and taxied to [the] gate. It was [late] at night and I approached [the] gate cautiously. I couldn't see the aircraft parking outline very well and saw a left wing walker and individual standing on the centerline. I began my turn and noticed the wheels of one baggage cart was inside the parking lines and stopped the aircraft. Simultaneously; I discovered that the individual I thought was the guide man had walked away. At this point I realized we did not have a guide man and directed the FO to notify Ops of the need for a parking crew. After about a 10 minute wait; a crew showed up. The guide man began motioning me to taxi into the gate; however; we had several items inside the parking lines needing to be moved. We had to open both windows and forcibly direct each wing walker to move all of the items; which was quite frustrating. Finally; the baggage cart; cones and extra chocks were moved and we could follow the guide man's instructions to park. The parking was uneventful. [Later]; while sitting in another aircraft being pushed by a tug; it occurred to me that I had made a mistake. I looked at my iPad and realized at that point that I should have shut the engines down and demanded a tow into [the] gate.It was night and the FO and I were fatigued from six continuous days of flying. [The gate] had multiple items inside the parking lines; but we could not tell for certain until I began the turn. Finally; I became fixated on looking for items inside the parking lines that I mistook the individual standing on centerline as the guide man. While waiting several minutes for the parking crew our frustration grew and then was exacerbated attempting to direct each wing walker to move equipment out of the parking lines. All the while; the guideman was motioning me to continue to park. Being slightly fatigued and extremely frustrated; I parked the aircraft completely forgetting the tow-in procedure.
After a long 5 days of work; I was tired. Forgot all about to shut down the engines and wait for the rampers to come out and tow us in after we made the initial turn towards the gate.
B737 flight crew reported they taxied into a gate when they should have called for a tow-in citing fatigue as a factor.