Aeroplanes Getting Stronger Seats And Better Pillows Airbags

@darkstar: Sorry to jump on top of your comment, but, I strongly feel that this needs to be said. WHY NOT JUST TURN THE DAMNED SEATS AROUND!? D: I've been saying this for years. The majority of the impact (the impulse) will be absorbed into the seat cushion. Some bounce MIGHT occur but experiments could be done to figure out how much and possible ways to limit it. Note that airbags are expensive, add weight, and often result in broken noses and decapitated babies.

Zencyde

Just more ways to muffle screams when the plane is going down.

glyphon

@Bryce Clifton: Actually, what I meant was that the bags are too tiny for the people who do get airsick. Try 2 or 3 of them. I am a white knuckle flyer and keep plotting ways to tape them all together to MAKE the parachute.

Oh yeah, and I DO pay attention to the flight attendants with their safety announcements. Usually right before I ask the person sitting next to me if I can hold their hand during take off.

@huntred:
Where did this stat of 56% come from, other than this book? Was it inclusive of all 'accidents' or crashes/ditches specifically? I'd guess that this is a typical example of manipulated statistics. Sure it's 56% when you count hitting a bird and accident.

Bryce Clifton

@Curves: You cant open a door at anything over 11,000 feet due to air pressure. Also, Flight Attendants would have to make their safety announcement 20x longer to show people how to use a parachute, not like anyone would pay attention, and no one would know how to use one properly. Oh, and what's to keep it from getting taken off a plane when someone leaves, OR where are you gonna store said chute?

Airsick bags get used everyday. Just cause you've been lucky enough to never get sick doesn't mean there aren't hundreds of others who don't use it every time they fly.

Bryce Clifton

@orthorim: "You won't be seeing it on American Airlines any time soon thats for sure."

Fixed it for ya

Evan Jacob

@Serpent2:

Co2 cartridges for the vests, dunno about the rafts.

Evan Jacob

@Hello Mister Walrus: Jet fuel isn't highly combustible in the sense of what you're thinking. Its a thick, oily fluid, much like kerosene. So while it can ignite, and stay burning for a long time, it doesn't explode in the same way that say, gasoline does.

Bryce Clifton

How about putting me into a fireproof/damage proof shell? :)

Jason R

great, one more thing to break and cause maintenance delays.

awperk

@BergenCountyJC:

How do the life vests and rafts inflate?

Serpent2

i have nothing

realsnickers

They are expecting more crashes, and they are always prepared, just like the Marines.

mikegriffin

all this effort for such a miniscule number of accidents or injuries...yet most mass transit trains and city buses don't even have SEATBELTS. There are a LOT more buses in the US that have accidents vs. planes crashing. The NTSB should look at the bigger picture.

@Uncletwitch: "So again those with money survive"

The point made above is that there is greater seat spacing in first class, so right now those passengers may actually be at greater risk of serious injury because they don't have the seatback ahead of them to catch them. Notice they're also adding the airbags to non-first class bulkhead areas, which suffer from a similar safety limitation.

Not that I think all this will do much good anyway, but the class warfare whine doesn't really apply here.

MauriceCallidice

@detox84: brill-ain't. Got it, got it.

CAVEperson

@Stephen N.: Seriously? No one? Am I missing something?

detox84

@Geraldo: Hmmm, airlines do have all of those things, cough it up and pay for first class, no such thing as a free lunch buddy.

yeti

@darkstar: It's quite useful if you hit a deer at 20,000ft.

Justin Culmo

@TheCapt: Creating extra legroom without decreasing costs is dreaming. Not increasing costs by not adding airbags and new seats is not dreaming.

Hello Mister Walrus

So first and business class get airbags, because of the seat separation, right. If you want an airbag in cattle class er I mean economy they charge you 10.00$ and hand you an air pillow used in shipping items.

@Curves: Actually yeah I have! Two months ago in some really strong crosswinds right before landing, this woman had some crazy panic attacks and used the same bag twice. First time in my life I ever saw that.

And this on a flight where, right after they pulled away from the gate, a panicked flight attendant ran around the cabin asking if anyone was a doctor! I thought that was something out of the movies...

@Windhawk: Seats facing backward? I remember when Southwest did that, it made me sick, literaly. If I had to sit facing the back I got motion sickness and I know I wasn't the only one.

@Hello Mister Walrus: I'd rather that they just remove one row of seats, to give me the extra 3 inches of leg room. Oh, and while we are dreaming, a more comfortable seat would be nice too.

@daqman: LMAO! Genius!!

Manny Ramirez

@frigg: Also as Mythbusters has demonstrated, a major issue is the tiny legroom in economy class: the front seat will catch you, possibly causing those face fracture you mention, but also break your hips and legs making it almost impossible to survive an otherwise survivable accient if you could exit the wreckage fast enough.

rhade

@oxymoron2007: Pressure pushing down on me
Pressing down on you no man ask for
Under pressure - that burns a building down
Splits a family in two
Puts people on streets

secretmanofagent

You notice it said "First Class/ Business... So again those with money survive.. those without; end up in a mashed pile against the front of the plane.. And then when the plane catches fire, all that plastic that just saved your life(maybe)gives you a chance to get rid of all your skin... It's a crap shoot anyway...

Uncletwitch

Ejection seats with parachutes, I say.

orthorim

@facepuncher: You won't be seeing it on any American airlines any time soon thats for sure.

orthorim

@Hello Mister Walrus: Good point.

orthorim

@BergenCountyJC: du da da du do do do...under pressure.

oxymoron2007

@Geph_knows_more: Considering most crashes take place during takeoff or landing (if I remember correctly) insuring against the most likely form of crash seems like a good idea to me.

What about short people or children under 12? The airbags would do more harm than good for them, according to the warning in my car.

Just finished the last page of Amanda Ripley's "The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes - And Why" and enjoyed it greatly for a lot of reasons. One little stat that might be of particular interest to the "Why? You're gonna die!" camp is this: Of all passengers involved in serious plane accidents between 1983 and 2000, 56% survived. Apparently this is known in the industry however public perception is very different.

So with today's breakaway seats and no airbags, you've got a better than a coin flip chance to make it home after being involved in an accident (they come in all flavors - not just mid-air explosions). Increase the strength of the seats, throw some airbags in there and maybe that percentage can be ticked up a few points.

huntred

I'm pretty sure Tyler Durden has something to do with this.

shadowplay

@Windhawk:
my thoughts exactly.

Seats should be set facing backwards. Though, sadly, it costs the airlines less to pay out a death benefit than the cost of long-term health care for injured survivors.

Thus the 'moral hazard' of having airlines that may have an incentive to have crash passengers die rather than survive injured.

@daqman: What, nuns aren't good enough for you?

Hello Mister Walrus

@aerospaceman:
haha I said hijack in a thread about airplanes.

@BergenCountyJC:
sorry for the hijack, but what's up with your name? Do you live in Bergen County or in Jersey City (which is in Hudson county)?

@Geph_knows_more:
I think what he meant was that he would have loved to have pitched the new and improved seats to the airlines. There are probably a few airlines that aren't buying these yet, and ole' Billy would have taken care of that real quick.

BriGuy

It was my understanding that the airline industry is already struggling. How are the cheaper airlines going to afford this?

Well, i guess since it says "all new planes" which means we'll probably never see it unless we're flying to japan or europe.

How about no seats! Just have everyone sit around on the floor and play monopoly. When it's time to serve food or anything, that's what the T-Shirt cannon is for! You're gonna die if you crash anyways, so why feel safe in the first place! YAyyyyy! Fat people onboard? It's simple, just let them sit wherever they want but have human-size skewers for when you have to eat them in the Andes mountains.

MJDeviant

@Scotland:
funbags!

@Geph_knows_more:
and your point is?!??!

there's plenty of runway skids to go around.

@Geraldo: You get what you pay for. If you don't think the airplanes are comfortable, you can always upgrade to a higher seating class.

Hello Mister Walrus

@BergenCountyJC: I guess that's a valid concern, though cars have had airbags for decades, so I would think that the mechanisms are pretty fail proof at this point. Plus, there is already highly blow-up-able substance on airplanes - jet fuel.

Hello Mister Walrus

@aerospaceman: Yea, when you consider a skid on the runway a "plane crash" Airbags are going to help your when you crash into the ocean from 30,000 feet or into the side of a mountain...

@Chewbenator: He didn't die from head trama....

General Aviation has already started to introduce airbags in small aircraft.
I think it makes sense in this contest, because small aircraft have a higher chance of getting in survivable accidents due simply to pilot error during take-off and landing, when speeds are not that great. Also, the amount of fuel they carry is much less than airliners, so the chance of a fire seems reduced. Most of the time you see an airliner crashed on the ground, it is burned.
At the same time, a statistic I remember is that less than 15% of all aircraft crashes result in fatalities. In this context it makes sense to better protect the passengers against injuries with airbags and stronger seats, even if the injuries they sustain are not life threatening.

@Duckspwn: When you factor in the rapid decompression of a crash/heat/resonating impact, it probably doesn't matter what's inside but I'm sure the contents are still "under pressure".

BergenCountyJC

@CAVEperson: Complimentary sleep mask?

Scotland

@Geraldo: No kidding. I flew 3 times last year, and 2 of the three times my seat cushion wasn't attached to the seat, so it kept sliding around. Naturally, the plane was packed with no extra seats.

There was also a wobbly armrest.

If only I could have brought my Leatherman onboard...

winshape

@Hello Mister Walrus: I'd have to agree...seems like one more thing for the airlines to say "we have x and they don't" meaning they can/will charge more for their tickets. How many violent plane crashes do you see with survirors? Reminds me of the onion news report..

[www.theonion.com]

@Geraldo: Tolerable? Damn, you're pretty optimistic. I'm on the road about 30 weeks a year, and the only way I survive air travel is by sleeping through it.

@BergenCountyJC: Combustible? I was under the impression that airbags used sodium azide, which gives off nitrogen gas when heated.

Little to late for Billy Mays.

I am still pretty upset that everyone doesnt have an assigned and available parachute. And whats with the tiny air sick bags? Have you seen anyone get sick on a plane? It doesnt do much outside being handy for notes.

I wish airlines would be required to have seats that actually had legroom, didn't make your ass hurt, and had armrests that didn't cut off the circulations in your arms! f* more safety -- fix the things that make domestic air travel such a f*ing pain in the ass! :-)

/rant/ Sorry, I travel about 35-40 weeks a year, and domestic air travel is mostly just tolerable at best.

@daqman: I dunno... You'd have to *look* at that fat during the entire flight, including meals. Might be better to risk a face fracture.

CAVEperson

@daqman: BRILLAINT!

Stephen N.

This might be just me, but I'd rather have lower air fares than airbags that probably won't prevent my death in an already extremely unlikely event of a plane crash.

Hello Mister Walrus

It's very simple. You have alternate rows of seats facing backwards, like on trains, then put all the overweight people in the seats pointing backwards. In the case of an accident the forward facing people nosedive into cushioning rolls of fat!

daqman

Investigators have found that in mid air explosions, passengers often fracture their faces due to rapid deceleration of the plane, causing them to lurch into the back of the seats in front of them. While an air bag could prevent facial fractures, I guess that falls into the category of doesn't matter.

Is it safe to have combustible gas as in the airbags in the case of a crash as theorized above?

BergenCountyJC

Isn't that [the airbags] like wearing body armor while skydiving?