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Comment by skocznymroczny | Hacker News Reader

I'm so jealous of people who can sleep on long distance flights. When the lights turn off, most people seem to have no issue falling asleep and then wake up several hours later. Meanwhile I have to stare at the window for all those hours. I can try to sleep, but I won't fall asleep anyway, no matter how tired I am.

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This is why they have alcohol in airports.

If you want to be polite it's probably worth telling the crew to wake you if you snore.

And before the anyone tries to swoop in and score virtue points by linking to some study about how alcohol reduces "muh quality REM sleep" I'd just like to remind everyone that the alternative here is not sleeping on your flight.

I snore so loudly that I just can't sleep on a plane at all without feeling like a jerk. I fell asleep at SFO after coming back from Paris once and everyone was laughing at me.

You may get lucky with the anti-snore mouthpiece. I bought a boil-to-fit one for like $15 and it cut my snoring from epic to almost none.

First I've heard of that, will definitely look into it.

Some random, maybe useful info. The mouthpiece works by preventing the jaw from recessing back. From my pre-purchase research I found out there are 2 main causes for snoring, this works for one of them.

Before the first use you put the mouthpiece into very hot water, bite it with jaw going forward, then let it cool down. You can reshape it the same way later in case the fit is not good enough. This was the case with me - I was waking up with a totally sore jaw (too much forward shift). After the reshape it is much better.

People report it is possible to make it possible to breathe through the mouthpiece. I found it unnecessary - maybe it even improves the airflow through the nose (I am not sure - could be placebo).

Googleable keywords is "mandibular advancement device". Good luck.

This is awesome info. My dentist was already recommending a dental guard since I apparently grind when I sleep - but those are crazy expensive compared to what I'm seeing elsewhere now.

Does it work by pulling the lower jaw forward?

Yes, see my other reply.

I don’t want to be seen as swooping for virtue points, but it’s “muh quality deep sleep” that alcohol reduces. It increases REM sleep.

I usually fall asleep during taxi. It’s one of the reasons I don’t like driving a car, anything that moves makes me sleepy. I can sleep in cars, trains, buses & boats without a problem, even if I wasn’t tired before.

I have this too, and refer to it as carcolepsy.

Before kids I would semi-frequently fall asleep while taxiing and wake up when landing. It almost felt magical when that happened, like travel was instantaneous.

Pre-pandemic I would fly from Boston to India via Dubai six to eight times a year. It takes about 22 hours or so including layover. I take an Ambian an hour or two into the Boston-Dubai leg and with that I can sleep for seven hours or so. Before that I might be able to sleep for an hour if I was lucky. It really makes a huge difference.

Yup that's what I do too, better living through chemistry - I also split really long flights in two, spend the day somewhere in the middle and sleep two nights on the plane.

Don't make the mistake I did of taking them before take-off ... and then have the plane discover a fault on the runway ....

I seem to have developed a Pavlovian reflex. About 30 seconds after takeoff, I can't stay awake to save my life. My wife hates flying with me.

I sleep better on flying planes than on the ground. It's possibly the humming and the calming effect induced on me. Somehow I think this is a learned experience but I may be wrong. I just imposed on myself to be relaxed as I used to be very anxious and tense when I was flying. A few times of trying this and now I fall asleep as soon as the plane takes off and many times I skip the meals offered on the plane altogether because I'm deeply asleep. I somehow associated the experience of flying with something very relaxing that my such that body anticipates the flight, I already start yawning when I'm boarding the plane.

Same here, what a nightmare it is to take those long flights. I once waited 9 hours at an airport for a 12 hour flight; seldom been more exhausted than that. It wasn't even the last leg, so even more airports/waiting when we arrived.

Is there a worse place to wait than those airports? The shops sell Rolex watches, Hugo Boss suits, alcohol (let me lug some bottles of vine/booze across the globe to save $12) + perfume. Obviously some overpriced cafe's and restaurants there as well, but not exactly a cool place to "hang out".

I've spent some time in a VIP lounge once (it may have been for a train ride to Paris for which the first class ticket was just as expensive as a regular one), came on time on purpose just to sit there for a change :p. It was quiet, empty, you got offered a drink, etc. If it was a long layover, sleeping was likely an option, and with the attendant there you could ask them to wake you up if there was an issue with the flight. But, theoreticals; flying first class is 3-6x as expensive and I'm not convinced it's worth it.

Depends on the airport and lounge, but you can often buy your way in for $30-$40. As the food and alcohol are free, it’s not a bad deal if you’re hungry and thirsty but not picky.

Plus it’s a bit more secure so you can feel less worried about sleeping and your luggage going missing.

If you’re lucky, there might not even be any babies or children.

I think 3x as expensive is still worth it for long haul flight. One business seat space equal to about 3 economy seat space and you also got lounge access and priority checkin.

As a regular pleb who has only ever flown coach, I'm feel like first class is mostly people for whom the alternative is private/charter— viewed through that lens, it's a huge discount, and the extra perks are small compensation for hassles like abiding by someone else's schedule, having to use a major rather than regional airport, and needing to go through regular security (even with getting to use the priority queue).

Most of the people sitting in first class and using the lounge are frequent business travelers on upgrade. I've had lounge access a few times because my father in law used to travel from California to Asia every other month for a large part of his career, so now he has lifetime lounge access and can bring guests. Sometimes when we travel together some of us get bumped up to first. And when my dad was flying cross country every week for work, he was almost always sitting in first class on upgrade.

But we're definitely not going to be flying private. :)

I've only been to those a couple of times but they make all the difference. The relaxed atmosphere, the ability to take a shower/nap/drink makes you almost want to hang out at the airport.

Especially in the smartphone era, I actively enjoy having a couple hours to kill in an airport. I make sure that I have a range of activities to do depending on energy level (writing about my research / hacking on something / reading nonfiction / reading a "brainless" book / surfing through HN or reddit), have pre-meditated that it's okay to pay airport prices on a fancy coffee drink or a beer or whatever, have pre-meditated that I should have no expectations about productivity, and then just hunker down in a chair with my computer/phone/book and a drink and chill out. It feels very removed from the pressures of everyday life, which I like—I wouldn't be able to chill half as well if I were at home and felt like I was supposed to be doing something more important.

On an airplane you lose the internet, but the same general strategy works for me. Re. sleeping, it works for me to sleep when I'm able to and say "well if you can't sleep right now, read your book. Oh, you're too tired to read your book? Maybe it's time to sleep"

Flew from Seattle to Frankfurt last year in economy select which was current us first class seats. Had just enough internet to docs and a small amount of slack (1 active convo). Got so much work done reviewing docs and COEs while watching a movie on the pull out tv (bulkhead) aka laptop dual monitor. Would do again. Solstice so light the entire flight over the artic

These guys spent four days in a (large) airport: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYCETjh4eMc

There are also the stories of the people who have lived for months in airports. I guess you are lucky it was "only" 9 hours, but yeah, it doesn't sound pleasant.

> I guess you are lucky it was "only" 9 hours, but yeah, it doesn't sound pleasant.

We were in Caracas; so we were advised not to go into the city. It became a 9 hour stint at Burger King pretty much, which is enough.

If you look at long airports visits from a "survival" aspect, it's probably quite nice. Or at least compared to being on the "Alone" show; but certainly not something I'd recommend :-)

A cheap tablet can last for many, many hours on low brightness when playing movies, even without charging from a battery pack/laptop/seat port.

I've got a cheap samsung tab from 2017 with absurd 7000mah battery. Play movies full brightness for 7 hours. I only use it for flights but so worth it

My friends tease me that this is one of my (few) superpowers - I can sleep comfortably for 5+ hours on long-haul flights in coach.

Honestly, it's been a trial-and-error process. I discovered a few things that work for me (YMMV, of course):

* Length of flight helps. I NEVER could sleep on international flights to Europe when I lived in NYC, because those flights were ~6-7 hours, which is, I think, the worst possible length for sleeping. By the time dinner service is done and the lights are out, there's about 3-4 hours of solid quiet time before they start prepping for breakfast/coffee service. Not enough. When I moved to SF, the 10-12 hour flights to Europe turned out to be the perfect length.

* Time of flight helps. The best possible flight for sleeping for me are the 7pm departures out of SFO that land in Europe 10-12 hours later. That's basically normal sleep time for me, so my body is actually in sync with the flight.

* Supplements help. The magic combo for me is 3mg of melatonin + 1 glass of red wine :)

Re: supplements, there are a few to stay away from.

Ambien has costarred in a few of those "I'm sorry, they did what?" stories. It can make your behavior random if you don't fall asleep quickly or get woken early.

There was a period of time in my life when I could reliably fall asleep before take off and not wake up until after landing. Key points are to not recline your seat and make sure your seatbelt is visibly buckled so nobody wakes you up.

> When the lights turn off, most people seem to have no issue falling asleep and then wake up several hours later.

I have a feeling they're all struggling to sleep or sleeping poorly.

Poor sleep is still better than the boredom of hours on a plane.

No kidding. On the other hand, if it weren't for people like me holding the plane up by the armrests... bad things would happen, right?

I once got on a plane in the UK, feel asleep at the gate before we pushed back, and woke up on wheels down in New York.

I'm normally asleep before take off and sleep the whole flight. My wife and daughter normally just park me up against the window for the duration.

I normally wake with bit of a fright when the wheels touch down for landing though.

Same. I've never slept on one of these. It makes flying from the US west coast to Europe particularly unpleasant, as those flights usually arrive in the morning/early afternoon of the next day.

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