A320 Airbags
 

Paxed on a Jetstar A320 the other day, and was seated in a emergency exit row. Noticed very strange seat belts and discovered that they have a airbag fitted. No mention was made in the safety breifing card, or the verbal given to you by a F/A. Great idea, but why only the exits?:confused:

You'll probably find they will only be installed in locations where they are needed to fulfil head impact criteria.

:)

Correct froggy,

where there is a bulkhead installed or risk of impact to a seat in front where there is a bit too much space to adequately assume a brace position against the seat in front without risk of injury, or at least somethiing along those lines.

From memory it is a FAA requirement adopted by CASA as of last year, affecting all new build aircraft.

Most business/first class seats have them as well because of the plastic etc around the seat as well.

It is because most seats on civilian aircraft are the wrong way round. They should be facing aft.

Hence the term Reverse Flight.
Sorry, I just couldn't help it. :E

Erm... what aircraft have seats facing aft (apart from club seats)?

DIVOSH!

Okaaay.... That's ONE military aircraft.

Some of the seats in a Blackhawk face rearwards (but the Blackhawks also have front and side facing pax seats)



DIVOSH!

The Bristol Britannia was the last airliner to have all pax seats facing rearwards, huge success (NOT).

Flight Attendants (mostly) face rearwards. I was told (in the sort of discussion of aviation trivia/myths/outrageous facts) this was because the crash survivability was higher. Which sort of makes sense as you are forced forward in a crash, which for the FAs is backwards, just pushing them further into the seat.

In my aircraft everyone flies backwards except for me...:{

Dash8 300 series has the first row on the r/h side facing aft.

The airbag is there to enable the seat installation to meet HIC to FAR 25.562 and 25.785 (16g and HIC requirement). It is also virtually impossible to certify a side facing seat without an airbag.

Cabin crew face rearwards primarily as they need to be able to see all the passengers at take off & landing; it is also more survivable.

C5 Upper deck all face aft !