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Comment by hsbauauvhabzb | Hacker News Reader

Just because it was built that way doesn’t mean it’s not discriminatory. An aircraft being half a foot larger wouldn’t have been a big deal if they were built to accomodate tall people in the first place. 6’2 is not an uncommon height.

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I am 6’4 and I am baffled by that argument. Not being “discriminatory” against pilot height is not the most important design choice in an airplane. What about a 7 feet tall person? Would it also be “discriminatory” if they can’t be a pilot?

How difficult is an extra foot? People only get so tall.

But there is a pretty big difference between accommodating 93 percentile for men and 99.96 percentile, and that's only 5 inches in height between 6'1" and 6'6".

I think if you're in the 99.96 percentile for low height in women, that additional foot would be pretty difficult. You'd have a very hard time reaching all of the controls, and it's not like you can stand up to do so.

It's definitely harder to compensate for having a shorter reach. But it's not a competition. You don't need to put controls further apart to allow a taller person to fit, you can make it happen with chair adjustments.

> need to put controls further apart to allow a taller

You know that how exactly?

Maybe that the case but if it’s not maximizing safety and minimizing failure risk (so by extension any unnecessary complexity) should be prioritized over any accessibility concerns under any circumstances

Half a foot larger in what way? Length won't help much. Height? Then you're adding _a lot_ of additional weight because you have to increase the radius of the fuselage.

Big commercial planes do not have their radius defined by the seats and controls in the cockpit. It would not need to increase.

Or you shift the cockpit back

The Army will still let you fly helicopters if you're too tall for the Airforce.

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