Hacker News Reader

Comment by gumby | Hacker News Reader

Having been once in a aircraft-damaging emergency landing* decades ago I am surprised lap only belts are still the norm. There's a reason the crew has four point restraints, and I'd like to have it too.

* I won't call it a crash since the aircraft made it to an airport and to a runway. We had equipment failure in flight so there was plenty of time for the flight attendants to review our crash positions, confiscate shoes, move people around etc. Everybody survived and I think everybody survived the emergency slides intact. Very exciting to mid-20s me.

View on HN

This is what most people seem to get wrong about airplane seat belts—they are not there for the same reason as in cars: crashes. They are there to keep people from flying around and getting injured during turbulence.

Crashes in commercial planes are so rare that any single one almost always makes the news, while turbulence is extremely common. Let’s be fair and say that a seatbelt is not going to make a whit of difference when colliding with the ground at 200 MPH, so a 2 or 5 point harness are essentially the same in that regard. But a belt is plenty to help with turbulence.

Will there be a few instances, such as yours, where the extra protection would have been good? Of course, but there’s also a trade-off of weight, cost, and public resistance to strapping in like a race car driver. The other mitigations seem to work well enough when there is a situation.

I was reading a recent article on the NSTB's increased focus on reducing injuries from airplane turbulence and was surprised how low the baseline currently is.

"Accidents on U.S. airlines have become increasingly rare except for one category of in-flight mishap that has remained stubbornly prevalent: turbulence that leads to serious injuries.

More than 65% of severe injuries — or 28 of 43 — logged by U.S. accident investigators from 2017 through 2020 on airliners resulted from planes encountering bumpy skies, triggered by atmospheric conditions that could be worsening due to climate change."

Sure, let's reduce injuries. But 7 serious injuries per year seems quite good already compared to injuries from other forms of transportation. I wonder how many people are injured on shuttle buses to airports that lack seat belts. I'd have to guess it's more than that.

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/turbulence-continues-t...

This is a good point: the number of such incidents is so low the cost (including social resistance) doesn't make it worth it.

I would like it because I mostly sleep on the plane. Also I take a lot of transoceanic flights (or did pre covid) which seem to have more turbulence than transcontinental ones (perhaps less discretion for rerouting, especially ETOPS flights?).

I miss the back-facing seats which I always chose when I had the option, as they are much safer (except for the risk of flying debris).

Turbulence that results in people flying out of their seats is exceedingly rare, like a once in a lifetime experience for a commercial pilot. Airplanes will go to great lengths to avoid bad weather to avoid stressing the airframe and making passengers uncomfortable.

Anecdotally, I've been on more planes with lots of turbulence (that without the seat belt would have been potentially damaging) than I can count on two hands. I've never been in a plane crash. :)

I imagine part of the reason people don't fly out of their seats today is, well, seatbelts, but also likely depends on the airline/pilots as well.

Many business-class airline seats do now have three point seatbelts.

What I find funny is that this year I got to fly newer first class (places I fly to are $1k+ economy and close to $10k first class, so normally I avoid the latter), the type where you get to sit diagonally in your own little "bunk". Despite the whole seat obviously designed for more comfort, the belt had the lap and the shoulder parts, and many times they were much more anal about having both parts buckled up. Guess that's the tradeoff! Typical economy is miserably cramped so they get less restraints to feel a bit better.

It depends on the position of the chair, direction and hard surfaces you could hit. A shoulder strap is common on seats that don't face straight forward.

What was it about the emergency landing that made you surprised that lap only belts are still the norm? (Apologies if I'm asking about something blindingly obvious but I've not been in an aircraft-damaging emergency landing and I'm really interested to hear more about your experience.)

Probably what was briefly discussed in the article. So long as your seat stays anchored, a multipoint harness will keep you in position better. The injuries in the one accident were from people being moved side-to-side, not forward or up and down. The seatbelts didn't injure them, but the armrests did. A multipoint harness could (if worn properly) reduce those kinds of injuries. Of course, in a total failure where the seats become detached from the floor and the aircraft is rolling, no seatbelt or harness will save you.

At an airline training session I attended, a man who survived a famous passenger aircraft crash advised that one should get as low as possible in their seat and put their knees up against the back of the seat in front of you, while still buckled. The passengers that died around him were killed by the heavy luggage exploding out of the overheads and breaking their necks, so it's important to have your head below the seat back. The people who sat upright also tended to break their noses/faces on the seat backs in front of them. The speaker walked away from the crash with only a knee injury by bracing himself in the reclined position.

Interesting; this was the position they had us all adopt.

They also moved the "old"* people in the exit rows and asked a couple of us young men to take their places. Back then there was no pre-questioning to see if you're willing and able to open the exit windows. Interestingly, they gave us special instruction which was: "Don't open the window unless I [flight attendant] am disabled. I might not be opening it for a reason."

* probably around the age I am now, or younger, and I don't feel old. But I am a lot fitter today than people my age tended to be 30 years ago.

That instruction is standard procedure. Same for the cabin crew, they're instructed not to evacuate unless told to by the cockpit crew or unable to communicate with the cockpit after an incident.

The main reason is knowing which engine is on fire vs shutdown. So in almost all cases you want to captain to decide the moment of evacuation, not the cabin crew and certainly not a passenger.

Interesting, the last time I paid attention to a safety briefing, they had us put our arms folded in front of us on the seatback in front of us and then our heads against the arms.

Supposedly the call for this on the plane would be “Brace! Brace!” Cathay Pacific to Hong Kong before the world shut down.

"Confiscate shoes"?

I'd think they'd want to make sure your shoes were on, so that you could walk safely over whatever debris was produced.

> There's a reason the crew has four point restraints, and I'd like to have it too.

Isnt it because their seats are facing the other way?

No; that helps. Planes tend to crash into things, not get rear ended. Facing backwards means they aren’t flung forwards into things.

Regardless of orientation they have four point. As I noted in a different comment, I miss the rear facing seats; I used to choose them by preference and on trains or other vehicles with rear facing seats I always select them.

> confiscate shoes

???

Some shoes (eg. soccer cleats, heels) can puncture the inflatable emergency slides.

It’s for the slides, don’t want someone breaking an ankle and popping the slide in a high heel.

I thought it was that they don't one a high heel puncturing the slide

So you don't ruin the slide

It’s a slide rule

They seem to have started adding shoulder belts in some of the newer fully-lie-flat business/first seats on some airlines.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com