With regard to the poll question - are pax disrespectfull, I was slf taking off on a BA flight from ABZ to LGW in Jan. As we rotated the C/A yelled across the P/A for us to remain in our seats. To my amazment, I looked round and saw a pax behind me standing, opening up a locker! Getting out of your seat during turbulence because of the risk of wetting yourself is bad enough, getting out of your seat whilst taking off is inexcuseable. With millions of pax travelling frequently, it does not surprise me that there are some numptys out there.

Before 9/11 I had an open cockpit door on almost all flights and many of our pax visited the cockpit.

From their questions I learned that the majority of pax has absolutely no idea of what turbulence is. They even talk about holes in the air and the aircraft is falling into it, but who of us pilots has not heard these funny things??
So I thought of a short comparison to make an explanation.

My intention was (and still is) to tell my pax that turbulence is nothig to worry about if it is handled correctly, but if not it may be harmful.

So, here is my little story:

Air can be compared with water. There exist no holes in the air as there are no holes in water. As everyone knows there are waves on the surface of the water, either at sea or at rivers, especially if a river turns around a corner. The good thing with water is that you can see the waves and everybody knows what happens to a ship if the ship cruises over the waves.
Well, the same thing happens to the air. The daily weather forecast on tv shows satelite pictures of our weather and you can easily see that clouds and air moves not only straight but in curves. Unfortunately our routing today guides us along the edge of such a curve.
The same thing that happens to water in a curve happens to the air, the only difference is that we cannot see the air as we can see the water. Our aircraft behaves like a ship on waves with the little difference that we a just a little bit faster than a ship and therefore the waves we feel are not felt as a smooth up and down, they are felt as hard strokes and chokes.
Our aircraft is constructed to resist these chocks and we have to secure ourself with the seatbelt in order not to be thrown through the cabin.
I am sorry for any discomfort caused by the turbulence but we do our best to have the flight as smooth as possible and I ask you to remain seated with your seatbelt fastened for your own security as long as the seatbelt sign is on.
Thank you.

I have received a lot of positive feedback from our pax for this 2 minutes time, which are required for this anouncement and after my announcement there is no problem for the cabin crew with passengers not obeying the seatbet sign.

Fly safe
Fox Lima

Came back recently with SIA from Singapore to Heathrow and twice the seatbelt sign was switched on for chop for about 30mins.On each occasion after 5 mins the cabin crew lost interest rapidly followed by the pax,and everyone was moving around with the plane bouncing along,in moderate turbulence.
On the other side of the fence when I was working in ATC in Hong Kong,we had a China Southern who encountered severe CAT over Macau inbound to CLK.However the pilot said absolutely nothing about it either to Radar or Tower,and the first anyone knew was when they opened the door and out spewed numerous injured pax.
I just keep the belt fastened tight all the time especially on Far East airlines.Some don't give a toss even if you do hit the ceiling.

Have just arrived back from DOH to DXB on on that same airline that prides itself on so many awards!

Again the situation arose where we were taxying to the stand and there is a slight pause before the skipper completes his final move along the airbridge. It was an instant cue for a pax to be out of his seat and to open the overhead locker.

No CC on hand to tell him sit down as there jump seat positions are obscured from the cabin(need for CCTV?) and as the curtains have beewn fastened during the taxi so the great 'unwashed' at the back cannot see the forward cabin (surely a breach of the usual rules to have them closed before the a/c has finished docking ??)

Thus in order to inform the PAX that the a/c is still in motion & that he should sit down as his actions endanger others, I have to call across the cabin !!
(THIS IS NOT MY JOB BUT I DONT WANT RECURRENCE OF A BAG ON MY HEAD AS HAPPENED ON ONE OF THEIR FLIGHTS 2 YEARS AGO!!)

As I depart from the a/c I report the matter to the CC on the door, but there is little that they can do as they did not witness the incident and they again admit that there is little that they can do. My letter to airline is to follow in the next couple of days !!

However, on the walk ( Marathon ?) to the immigration hall, I am approached by the person's Levantine friend who berated me for calling across the cabin to tell his companion to sit down.

It is a long walk from the airbridge to immigration in DXB airport, so anybody who has been there will know the length of the conversation that took place, on the merits of cabin safety versus the embarassment and loss of face on his part!
Obviously there are cultural differences as to the perception of being polite versus having a 160kg body hurled at you with bags should the skipper have to brake suddenly!!

This is an issue for the CC's to rigorously apply (why else are they there?) and get the senioor CC to double up on announcements in the taxi and emphasise the safety aspect, or as NEO suggested earlier, get the skipper to halt the a/c in a safe location, until all PAX are secured!

Whilst it is law in the UK to obey the seat belt sign, but not in this part of the world, as far as I am concerned the skipper has 'de facto' rule of law for all souls aboard. (I wonder if PAX on this airlines A/C's at British airports indulge in this sort of carelesss beahviour?)

If this airline in question, does not enforce the rules strictly it will be only a matter of time before a pax takes out a legal action against them in the UK or US (when they start flying there!) or wherever an action will stick for endangering the pax on their flights!!
Nuff SAID!
:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

What suprised me most is that cabin crew sometimes are apparantly afraid to do something about passengers who not obey the fasten your seatbelt sign. On my recent Sao Paulo - Paris flight a passenger opened the overhead locker (and left it opened) while the plane was taxiing at CDG airport. None of the cabin crew bothered to close the overhead locker and talk to that passenger even though one cabin crew member past the overhead locker.

Allthough it may be good there is a law against not wearing your seatbelt when the sign is illuminated you also have to have the cabin crew to enforce these laws. Unfortunately I don't see this happen.

Flew LHR-SFO-PHX-ORD-LHR about a month ago. All UA and all except the ORD-LHR had one thing in common: neither the CC nor the PAX took one little bit of notice of the seatbelt signs. (Sorry to pick on one airline, I'm not saying that they're worse than anyone else...)

On the LHR-SFO leg, the CC were standing in a huddle next to my seat complaining to each other that the FSB sign was on and the PAX weren't sitting down. Not one made any effort to go and speak to those concerned. :confused:

The only person who made a difference was a steward on my last flight who, as soon as the signs went on, sat down on the crew seats beside the toilets (middle of cattle class, 777) and forcibly told the wayward PAX to go back - and cross their legs.



On the UA flights in question, they always repeated the same phrase at the end of the safety demo. "Federal Law requires all passengers to comply with lighted signs, placards and crew member instructions" (see, I was awake for those 3 minutes ;) ). So why not invoke Federal Law? On arrival at the gate, the sight of a big Marine + semi-automatic coming for Mr Awkward in 12C would probably make the others think twice on the return journey!