I just read an article in The Economist, issue dated 9/9/06, entitled “Fear of Flying: Welcome Aboard” (I’ve also posted the body of the article from emailing it to myself in a previous post).
It verifies some things I’ve thought about flying, since I fly so much. And it reveals how silly some things are on airplanes today.
Silliness #1:
They always tell you to shut off all electronic devices. They say cellphones and other devices can interfere with navigation systems. But the real reason is that they interfere with mobile networks at the airport. I’ve personally accidentally left my cellphone on many times and the airplane still got off the ground, with nobody announcing that “hey our navigation screens have so much static that we can’t tell where we’re going, so please re-check all your damn devices which we let you on the plane with, even though they may crash the plane but we let you on anyways with them.”
That just makes a crapload of sense of letting people onboard with devices and things that could crash the plane.
Corollary #1a:
It’s impossible to take into account everything that somebody can bring on board that could crash the plane. Case in point: detection of terrorists who are creative enough to mix explosives out of ordinarily innocuous fluids. We need to go to source of the problems or find better solutions.
Silliness #2:
Life vests in case of water landing. As the article states that in the history of wide bodied aircraft successfully landing on water is zero. Hmmm….
And those cool inflatable slides which detach as rafts. Well, if the plane can’t touchdown safely in water, what good are these rafts?
Silliness #3:
Listening to all those inane announcements like “Cross Check” and feeling secure about everything.
Does anyone even know what that is? Maybe it’s important to the stewards but I have no idea what it means. Maybe I feel a little better that simply because people sound official, it actually means they know what they’re doing…?
Just shut up and let me go to sleep. Oh wait, we’re landing and they just told me to put the seat in its most upright position for landing, or translate: it’s MOST UNCOMFORTABLE position because my spine is now in its worst ergonomic position since designers of aircraft seats have never taken a class in ergonomics. And yet I’ve landed numerous times with the seat accidentally tilted back and nothing bad has happened at all.