In recent times, alarming reports have emerged about assaults on flight attendants. In response to this crisis, flight attendants and other essential airline workers affiliated with the Transport Workers Union (TWU), staged a significant action at Newark Liberty International Airport. This action aimed to raise awareness about the ‘Assault Won’t Fly’ campaign, which targets the increasing incidents of unruly passengers assaulting airline staff.
Food, drinks, service, fares, seats, safety? Which matters most to you in the aircraft cabin? What elements of the aircraft cabin interior should airlines focus on to improve the overall passenger experience? Take the survey!
Are airline safety videos over, or can a well plotted story-building formula survive a ditching?
Back in the day, when I wasn’t busy helping make aircraft interiors beautiful, I persuaded cabin crew that it was important to kick sharks in the nose.
This was more theory than practice. But it was based on expert survival advice for the unimaginable consequences of an aircraft ditching.
Discussing preparations for an aircraft ditching involved overcoming the audience objection, “That’s probably never going to happen.”
This reaction was based on the indisputable fact that landing a large commercial aircraft on the water–without it breaking up into many little pieces–is a difficult operation.
Still, ditching training is required because it can and has happened. However remote, we must consider all possible emergency conditions in airline safety procedures.
The company I worked for specifically dealt in water survival devices (lifejackets and life rafts). It was part of my job to help crew focus on what to do on the off-chance that they found themselves caring for passengers in open waters.
This was even before US Airways 1549, the exception that proved all the rules.
Though I referenced several other previous aircraft ditching events, it was difficult to persuade airline crew and engineers to pay close attention when they were betting it would never happen to them.
American Airlines Flight AA206 which departed from Miami International Airport with Destination Milan was diverted to St. John’s International Airport due to reported injuries onboard. Airport representatives present reported injuries were due to in-flight turbulence.
Do you enjoy having someone look over your shoulder at work and, what’s more, publish all of you perceived peccadilloes for the world to see? You’re in luck!
You could now get a job as cabin crew or flight crew to ensure that happens.
Someone has now created a Twitter feed expressly intended to shame airline crew who “misbehave.”
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has announced that the Kingdom of Thailand does not follow International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) safety standards. It has lost its Category 1 International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) rating and downgraded to Category 2 rating, based on a reassessment of the country’s civil aviation authority.
Years from now, anthropologists will debate the exact moment that the genre of the entertainment safety video crossed over from the sublime to the ridiculous. To save them time, I’m positing that the meme finally killed it off, and it was the incredible success of Delta’s Internetest Safety Video on the Internet that done it in.
How can over 9 Million views on YouTube be a bad thing, you ask?
UPDATE Delta has taken its most popular safety video of all time private. A story in itself, which I am investigating with the airline. However, the internet never forgets so for the purpose of posterity, here is the original.
For the love of all things holy!Someone had better explain to gadgety luggage innovators that building lithium-ion batteries into their luggage is not a good idea–no matter their best intentions to come to the rescue of the power-hungry connected passenger.
The Flight Safety article specifically mentions a recent incident the flight diversion of a British Airways Boeing 787-800, operating flight BA18 from Seoul to London Heathrow, with 205 passengers onboard, which diverted to Irkutsk, Russia, after the battery of a passenger’s smartphone “suffered an obvious thermal runaway and emitted smoke,” according to a report by the Aviation Herald.
Hawaiian Airlines has produced a beautiful destination safety video that will get you dreaming of warm days on the beach and cool treks through verdant mountains. As an added twist, the video comes with subtitles in Hawaiian, so you can catch up on the lingo before you land.
If anything, that should get passengers to pay close attention, but the locations are gorgeous! Hawaiian made this a true ‘ohana project by featuring cabin crew and their family in the video demonstrating the safety instructions while enjoying fun outdoor activities.
Nik Loukas at InFlight Feed shared this image of an irresponsible fool onboard an Iberia flight. Whoever you are: You don’t deserve that seat.
This image highlights how little some passengers understand about the responsibilities that go along with the coveted extra legroom in the exit row.
We’ve all seen passengers treat the cabin badly, sit in ways they’d never sit at home, do damage to interiors which cost a fortune to develop and install. That’s really bad. But this is worse:
I spent a bit of time this month writing about IATA’s proposed ‘Cabin OK’ program: introducing it, clearing up misconceptions, and, finally, reporting on its demise, er, “pause.”
This is the second of two posts today, which review the Cabin OK aftermath. I promise to let the matter drop after that.
IATA Cabin OK Bag, IATA Flickr
I must say I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a general uproar brought about by a single proposal by IATA, or airlines in general.
Now that the hullabaloo has all but subsided, I’d like to highlight the positive side of all of this–power to the people–and some opportunities to get really riled up, which we should not let pass us by.
