No, I'm talking about risk mitigation, not control.
Questions:
Is this still about risk mitigation? If yes, are you at risk now? Why don't you wear your bike helmet at work all day? (never know when a ceiling tile could fall down)
Would your opinion change following this hypothetical media blitz? Would you hop on the bandwagon and decry the irresponsibility of the anti-helmet folks?
If you think about this for a second before hitting that downwards pointing triangle, does this dumb example mean that it's actually more about what's socially acceptable than actual safety? Why would you feel dumb wearing a helmet all day now, and dumb for not wearing it in that world?
- Planes fly through the atmosphere in varying conditions. - The conditions that lead to uncomfortable or dangerous turbulence are not at all uncommon. - These conditions are unpredictable and have little warning. - Wearing a seatbelt is a very minor inconvenience, and will protect me from the worst of the harms that can come from common turbulence. - I will wear a seatbelt.
This doesn't seem complex.
The argument about bike helmets, although nuanced, should have nothing to do with celebrities wearing them or not.
Not true at all. The vast vast majority of turbulence incidents are very well predictable. It's not 1930 anymore.
> - The conditions that lead to uncomfortable or dangerous turbulence are not at all uncommon.
Except your flawed logic in the previous point flows to this point. The question isn't turbulence but unpredictable severe turbulence which is much rarer. About 1 per million flights I think which is far from common.
> A smart, independently minded person, would do the following risk analysis:
Given the flaws in the risks analysis I find this sentence hilarious.
On the large scale, yes, on the scale that causes a plane to drop a meter at very short notice, no they aren't. If they were, I wouldn't have been in planes that dropped a meter without any warning. Your "1 per million flights" is probably based on statistics relating to reported injury (correct me if I'm wrong). Those statistics would be skewed by many factors, not least people wearing seatbelts.
I've flown probably around a few hundred times. I've experienced uncomfortable (spilt drinks, rollercoaster feelings) probably about ten times. I've had actual dangerous turbulence (both times, as you say, with warning) twice. Once into Frankfurt, once into Singapore.
On a couple of flights the turbulence warning from the flight crew has come through after the initial experience of turbulence.
I'm not saying we're not good at detecting it, and I'm not saying it's super common, but your one in a million number is wishful thinking.
By the way, I actually love flying, and I still regard it as an incredibly safe way to travel, but wearing a seatbelt is still a good idea.
Turbulence due to weather is what you are talking about.
Sometimes zero warning, and major harm, as in the current case.
this risk calculation is messy of course, as we all have different tolerances for inconvenience and risk, and we also have different responses to individual vs. collective risks.