More passengers than seats!

[Sam Rutherford]

I have a question!

I want to do some flying later this year with 5 pax in a four seat a/c. Three of the pax are under 20kgs.

Is there flex on pax numbers whilst the CG and MAUW are well within limits?

With the airlines, babies don't have their own seat - same for GA?

Thanks, Sam.

[S-Works]

A child (under 2 ISTR) may be carried on the lap of an adult. You can even get special lap straps that thread through the standard lap belt to hold them. I have a set on my spares box in the aircraft.

[BackPacker]

With the airlines, a baby (I think one baby per person) is kept on the parents lap, with a seatbelt extension clipping onto the parents seatbelt. And the max weight of the kid is, I believe, 15 kgs.

How are you going to handle this in your aircraft? Do you have these seatbelt extensions? Note - putting two small children in one belt obviously leads to a crush in one another if the unthinkable happens and might do more bad things than good.

But another problem you might want to think about is air sickness. Assuming the other adult is in front as well, if a kid gets sick, how are you going to attend to this? And with little kids: if one goes, they all go...

Unless you've taken the kids up, individually, and know how they react to flying, I would not do this.

And most kids of that weight/age don't even appreciate the flying anyway, so why bother?

[Sam Rutherford]

They have all flown (with varying degrees of indifference) - it's a question of getting from A to B rather than just taking them flying to go flying.

Sam.

[BackPacker]

If you can trust the oldest one not to touch the controls, put him/her in the RHS. Other adult in the back with the smallest on his/her lap, with a separate safety belt extension, and the middle one next to him/her. Sounds safest to me. As long as you have one of these extension straps or something and remain within W&B, I don't see a problem.

The definitive answer should of course be in the POH - look in the limitations section.

[Three Yellows]

I'd also check your insurance policy.

[Pilot DAR]

Yes, Three Yellows has made the important point. It is very likely that the aircraft involved is insured for a certain number of passengers, which rarely exceeds the number of seat positions. Exceeding that number of passengers, and presenting a claim, is not going to work out well at all. For a while I insured my C150 for three passenger seats in addition to pilot for this very reason. Like the C150, most single Cessnas do have a "kiddy seat", and seatbelts approved for the back. I have flown a factory legal six place C172. I cannot say of Piper or other manufacturers had similar kits.

Also, be very careful putting the kid in the front, and the adult in the back. some aircraft I can think of would likely be out of C of G limits doing this.

It is not worth the risk preventable injury to have passengers not properly secured into the aircraft by the approved means.

Pilot DAR

[BEagle]

A soundproof, leakproof box secured in the luggage compartment?

[RatherBeFlying]

If the two smaller children have car seats, it may be possible to secure two of the seats with a single lap belt.

Remember that in a sudden deceleration the two seats will tend to splay to the side; so you would need to secure them together with webbing from your local climbing shop.

There still remains the issue of top tethers for the car seats and any possible reaction of the authorities discovering more passengers than seats.

Small children generally require quite a bit of baggage -- perhaps a larger airplane will be needed.

[SNS3Guppy]

I've run with five to six in a 182 lots of times..but with only one seat.

Give everybody a parachute and tell them to pull the silver handle last.

There are no perfectly good airplanes.

[Brooklands]

I've a suspicion that the TB20 is certified for 5, but Its a few years since I flew one. IO540 should know.

Brooklands

[Sam Rutherford]

Does anyone know where you can get an infant restraint belt (as per BA et al)? Short of walking off your long haul with it, obviously! :O

[BackPacker]

Sounds like something you should be able to get from Aircraft Spruce (www.aircraftspruce.com), but I could not find it in their online catalogue. Give 'em a call or try calling any of the other online aviation supplies like AFE.

[Sam Rutherford]

I have tried the usual suspects without success...

Sam.

[ringo_1]

I can't remember the name of the place now (maybe someone on here could help) but I got one from a pilot supply shop at Biggin hill.

Edit - Having a quick Google, I think it may have been Adams Aviation. I couldn't find one on their website but it may be worth giving them a call.
http://www.adamsaviation.com/

[radicalrabit]

The kids have grown , the 12 year old is 5 ft 8 taller than her mum the 7 year old has legs like a giraffe that reach up to her armpits and she is damn near 5 ft tall already add to that the kids mum who probably weighs slightly les than a wilderbeast and my 6 ft 2 frame plus the two adults who live with us most of the time...... Are we looking at a Cherokee Six? or a Navajo ? That would put the pax weight at about 728lb... Going to need to get something pretty big if we are going to use this frequently eh?.. Any thoughts......:confused:

[Pilot DAR]

Radicalrabit

Cessna 207 is a great hauler. They're a little funny looking, but gentle to fly. I prefer them to the 206, although they still require a bit of muscle in pitch. They are not as common, but often not too expensive either, as they are not as desireable as the 206, because they don't go on floats easily. The other feature which is much better than the 206, two front doors and the clamshell doors in the back, plus nose baggage! There's also lot's of extra compartments for remote avionics if you need it.

With a STOL kit, 500m will seem like lots of runway. Expect a larger cost to insure all those seats though...

Cheers, Pilot DAR