World’s Most Cramped Airline Seat to Launch Next Week

[Mac the Knife]

Just when you thought that you had reached the apex of discomfort

World’s Most Cramped Airline Seat to Launch Next Week | Gadget Lab | Wired.com (http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/09/worlds-most-cramped-airline-seat-to-launch-next-week/)

Mac

[daikilo]

Re comfort: horse or push-bike saddle with floor as pedals?

Re realism: frame looks far too light. How on earth will you meet aircraft certification cases (16G deceleration)? Surely occupant may well literally take-off (or rotate around feet) and pull seat out of floor!

[pattern_is_full]

On the whole, I'd rather just be loaded (no more SLF) into containers filled with navy bunks. You can probably get the same "packing" without sore knees and embolisms - and with a nice nap.

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/g80000/g86312.jpg

[kwateow]

The girl looks very pleased about something... the saddle maybe...

[rmac]

Looks like a wet dream for MOL

[vctenderness]

Blimey! I bet 'Mental Micky' has already put in his order (along side the standing up ones)

[Cubbie]

no seatbelts either....:}

[HappyLittleRainCloud]

Surely they'll have to put a weight/size limit on them?? Passengers will have to give their weight and butt measurements before booking a seat. What about young children/vertically challenged people who will be hanging off of them like being on a swing? Hmm...

[LGB_SLF]

I'd have to file that one under ARE YOU KIDDING ME??!!??

:eek:

[rcsa]

No prizes for guessing which airline will be installing this first... At 6' 4", I can't wait to try this...:eek:

SkyRider: new 'saddle' seat allows airlines to 'cram' more passengers - Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/8001351/SkyRider-new-saddle-seat-allows-airlines-to-cram-more-passengers.html)

[Deep and fast]

Stuff sitting on that for up to 3 hours :eek:

D and F :8

[HappyLittleRainCloud]

:ugh::ugh:

[Spunky Monkey]

Well if she is going to sit next to me, I might give it a go. Although I would insist that it is MY armrest.

It would be good for building up the leg muscles...and...airport security would give the frequent flyers a break.

As they would be able to tell who is a regular passenger.

They would walk off the plan like John Wayne.

Come to think of it O'Leary is a cowboy...these saddle seats are just what he needs...:E

[Hartington]

Not that I'm really expecting answers but....

1) What do you do with a baby? No lap for a lap and extension belt. How would you attach a car seat? Would a car seat even fit?
2) Children and adults with legs that don't reach the floor. How do they manage?
3) Cubbie says there's is no seat belt. On the assumption that there has to be one how will work? (Yes, I know "insert the metal ....."). I'm asking how it will restrain vertical movement in particular, where would it be anchored?

[ExXB]

This has got to be a hoax. Why would Cryanair or any other LCC go for these? They cannot increase the number of seats on their aircraft (they are at the legal maximum already). Network airlines, in theory, could improve their business/first class sections by squeezing these into the back, but this is just as unlikely.

However seeing the media frenzy on this IMHO somebody is looking for free advertising, and getting it.

[twb3]

There is a very special place in hell reserved for those that would design and build this abomination, as well as any airline executive that would have them installed on their fleet.

Of course, none of that will stop any of them if a "business case" can be made for it.

TWB

[purplehelmet]

this has to be someone taking the p*** out of mol. no one in thier right mind would want to fly any where in one of those seats no matter how cheap it was.

[bedsted]

I am surprised the news has not reached here earlier. These seats have been chosen to withstand high g forces during vertical acceleration and therefore will be ideal to install in the space shuttle MOL is purchasing for his scheduled joy flights around the moon next year.:ok:

[AIRWAY]

I will not be flying in these type of seat, unless I am forced too or no alternative. There is always a choice for the time being... Hopefully :uhoh:

[Hotel Tango]

There will be a market for these seats as they will most likely be tolerated by the younger (and fit) generation of passengers with little money - and then maybe only on relatively short flights (1 - 2 hours). I can't see the older generation accepting that level of discomfort at all. I certainly wouldn't. The more LCCs fit these type of seats the more new business will go to the legacy carriers. There's of course also the possibility that LCCs will have 2 class cabins: Extreme Cattle Class and Standard Cattle Class.

One thing is for sure, unlike AIRWAY, I won't even be forced to use one of these new seats. I'd give up flying if that's all that was on offer in Y class in the future.

[InSeat19c]

I dread to think what will be thought up next.

The lack of leg room on aircraft doesn't inspire much confidence in the "passenger safety is the number one priority" mantra with me at the best of times anyway.

[BYveterangirl]

The lack of leg room on aircraft doesn't inspire much confidence in the "passenger safety is the number one priority" mantra with me at the best of times anyway.

I'd be careful going down that route. The very same subject came up in another thread. Posts were removed and their posters banned.

[InSeat19c]

@BYveterangirl Thanks for the warning and fair comment. What I said was just an observation as a punter, but certainly wasn't a dig and the pilots or the cabin crew :)

[Oldaircrew]

How are they going to get past the evacuation criteria? With this pitch, you will be able to fit almost 220 people on an A320. Has the aeroplane been certified to evacuate 220 people yet?

[jetjockey696]

Agence France-Presse


A new design for economy class airline seating gives a new meaning to the term “cattle class” — as passengers would sit on saddle-type seats, even closer to the person in front than now.

The “SkyRider” design, unveiled at a trade fair in California, may appeal to budget airlines around the world eager to save valuable extra inches in the back end of planes.

The new seats would decrease the pitch, or distance, between seats to 58 centimeters or less, compared with an average of 70 centimeters, said Italian company Aviointeriors.

“With a much reduced seat pitch, the SkyRider preserves a comfortable position for the low fare passengers,” it said as the new seats were presented at the Aircraft Interiors Expo Americas trade fair.

The SkyRider “is intended as a new basic class. The passenger’s seating position is similar to that of a touring motor-scooter rider,” it added. “This posture permits that the overall longitudinal space occupied by the seat with the seated passenger is far less than that of a conventional, very high-density 28 inch economy class seat.

“The SkyRider has been designed and engineered to offer the possibility to even further reduce ticket prices while still maintaining sound profitability, which, even with a dual or three class seating arrangement, will allow maximum certified passenger capacity of the aircraft.”

In another cost-slashing bid, Irish budget airline Ryanair’s publicity-friendly boss Michael O’Leary has suggested he would even be prepared to introduce standing-room only sections in his planes although this would likely be banned by European safety rules.

[BOAC]

New Seat Design Could See Air Passengers Straddling- Aha! A new challenge for the 8.047km high club.

[PAXboy]

Seems as if the plan by the seat designer is not to get carriers to have every row in this style but to have just a few rows at the back.

If, on short haul, they replaced (I can't be bothered to do the maths with seat pitches) six regular rows of Coach with nine of these, then you go from 36 pax to 54 in the same space?

That would allow different fare grades to be given to those seats for those who want to skimp and other folks can take the regular Y. Mum and Dad can have seats and the teenagers can perch.

Some a/c might have some Biz seats up front, some Y and some Cattle. Sounds like it could work. You would have to balance total numbers and loos and doors but that's just matching the regs and the maths.

[Hotel Tango]

Seems as if the plan by the seat designer is not to get carriers to have every row in this style but to have just a few rows at the back.

Which is basically what I said:

There's of course also the possibility that LCCs will have 2 class cabins: Extreme Cattle Class and Standard Cattle Class.

;)

[crewmeal]

And where exactly will all the hand baggage go when you have virtually doubled the passenger load in the cabin? Ah yes, now is the time to charge 15 pounds for it to be put in the hold.

[TightSlot]

If Ryanair can already operate profitably using existing seats and yet sell seats for £0.01 to £0.99 what is the financial incentive to the passenger for these new seats? In a mixed config cabin, how much money could you save by being seated in one of these rows - £0.01?