The booming, high-stakes arms race of airline safety videos
thehustle.co
thehustle.co
It very literally showed everything talked about happening inside an actual airplane. Masks actually deploying and dropping from the ceiling and people putting them on, etc.
What was interesting for me was, it was the first time I saw _where_ under the seat the life jacket is and it made me realize that despite having watched 100s of these videos I actually never knew how to get the life jacket.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2IZP5NhaKM
They used to have a really good "behind the scenes" video for it as well, but I can only find this shortened version on online:
Probably serves its function better for it too! I can't imagine nearly as many people would tune it out or just feign attention, but it's not totally sacrificing the focus on what matters.
They even do split-screen to add in distraction, when they're trying to show something visually in the less-interesting window. (Worst lesson ever mis-learned from TikTok.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jep3RR2yEXA
Did they consciously decide that most people have heard the instructions many times, and the best the airline can hope for is that passengers pause and look up from their personal devices, and maybe subconsciously reactivate those neurons even the slightest bit... as better than nothing?
Or did the creatives simply get carried away, and no one reined them in?
Seriously, a flight safety video has absolutely no right to be this catchy :D
"In the unlikely event we need to get you outside, these exits come equipped with an inflatable slide..."
I'm impressed that they were able to slip in a jab about the ridiculousness of having to tell you how to buckle a seatbelt.
I searched for it in the article's list of videos with greater than 1M views but the author failed to capture it.
It also seems like a waste of money that presumably finds it way onto ticket prices.
I sort of assumed that Air NZ started this trend because of all the hype surrounding the first ones. There's an article covering the history of these here: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/the-wireless/374709/feature-a-bri... (they claim the first was in 2009, so a couple of years after the earliest one mentioned in tfa).
I find them downright annoying now. The cringe factor makes them uncomfortable to watch which is not what you want from a safety video. It feels as though they jumped the shark.
As far as I can tell, they use real crew to present the concept, so maybe that doesn't as any actors, but it is definitely not completely animated.
They have the exotic settings that the article mentions, though.
I always assumed this was one of those American cultural things, akin to how waiters in the US always are super cheery and excited to serve you. (In an obviously artificial way)
The author of the article is a bit of a jittery flier (a go-around was their come-to-Jesus moment? come on), but fine, whatever makes people pay attention to basic safety information. It doesn't need to be much: know where the emergency exits are, how to open them if necessary, and don't take your cabin luggage, and you'll already be ahead of most.
So what I have to say, yes, the measure of the effort what pretty much sums to entertainment and pseudo-psychology, speaks to the consumer masses who are worried when they jump on a plane filled with other 150~ish strangers.
I also wonder if the flight attendants in aisles physically demonstrating and making eye contact with passengers has something of an effect of guilting you into paying attention. There's no guilt in ignoring a screen talking at you in an obnoxious way.
Probably my biggest dislike about these safety videos is when they demonstrate safety features with fake props and "clever" representations of aircraft. If they are going to use visual aids they should try to match your environment so that you know what to look for in a real emergency.
My second biggest dislike about these videos is the cognitive overload. Sure, there's an argument that something catchy will help grab your attention so that you aren't just tuning out the safety information, but on the other hand so many of these videos turn into an incredibly high-stimulation affair. There's more of a focus on jokes and visual gags that it's hard to stay focused on the actual safety instructions on offer.
I certainly felt that guilt the one time years ago I was the only passenger on a 737 on what was effectively a dead leg from ORD to ROC. The flight attendent just came right up to my seat and did the demo staring straight at me. It was very uncomfortable. After she did it though, she was very nice, and told me she wouldn't bother coming through the cabin but that she'd be right up front if I needed anything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=al51WZcN2_U
It takes over 30 seconds before any visual instruction starts.
The business class shoulder harness isn't shown at all and is instead a tiny icon with a moving background shot taking up most of the screen.
The overhead bin animation is not taking place inside a real plane, is barely an outline of a part of a plane, and has most of the image being of a historic building in the background.
The instructions are then interrupted by dancing on the beach for about 10 seconds.
The next instructions has a set of dancers and a very colorful Kathakali dancer taking up most of the screen while the electronic devices are a tiny icon.
No smoking is again a small icon on the side of the screen with the foreground being a much more interesting and compelling visual.
Another 10 seconds of dancing...the video is interrupted constantly and made unnecessarily long.
Emergency exit doors shown as an outline again in a colorful historic building with a dancer moving around as the focal point.
Then the exit aisles are shown not in a plane but as part of an old building.
Oxygen masks aren't shown connected to the plane so it's hard to say where they're coming from.
More dance interruptions with no instructions.
The life vest is probably the first thing that's just as clear as seeing the in-person demonstration.
Then the last 30 seconds is all timewasters.
Again, great video, but it's a brand and tourism advertisement and not a safety video.
I don't think the current video format is very good for retention. Putting it in the form of a quiz could help frequent travelers actually memorize the information over time, which could in turn save lives.
There’s also the argument that to improve retention, the regulatory body should decrease the amount of “key safety messages” that need to be included in the videos (which ends up being around 35-45). If you decrease that number, retention of the info you do mention should go up.
It reinforces the brand. Virgin gets to show it's sexy. ANA that it's fun but sophisticated. United that it has four neurons firing across the enterprise.
I would expect it's at least slightly better for morale, recruiting, and retention. I also expect that executives and middle managers move to use these as an opportunity to reinforce corporate values, whatever that means to them.
Art was imitating life when SNL dropped this extremely over-the-top parody of a live-action safety briefing, showcasing talents of Luke Null and the seasoned veteran Will Ferrell: https://youtu.be/Ji0TgBy085U?si=3ZHQk9p6wWZB4Oja
They straight up have a "weapons display" showcase of things you shouldn't bring, as if you were looking at a scene where john wick would choose his weapons.
Spending so much on production and the content is actively distracting you from the core message… just totally lost the plot.
That was always my favorite one.
https://youtu.be/-VzSiilYSKs?si=dC_e9NTeiCFz74eN
In the mid-90s, I attended a live lecture by John Waters at a San Diego university campus, and smoke he did, in a non-smoking building on a tobacco-restricted campus, and he took approximately 2 drags while the thing turned into a long cylinder of ash.
It's been really difficult, and somewhat undesirable, for airlines and other places to eliminate smoking. Especially when there's literally nowhere to take refuge whilst in the air on a long flight.
I've also been incarcerated in mental hospitals where smoking was practically encouraged/required. We would all go "take a break" in an enclosed courtyard, and if you didn't smoke, you definitely got it second-hand, up close and personal.
Although nicotine is generally a stimulant, it's also a laxative and people who can't smoke become extremely anxious and agitated. I suspect that commercial flights today have escalating discipline problems with passengers who become extremely unruly just from hunger or jonesing for nicotine. Flight crews should dole out complimentary transdermals.
So it is generally considered best for psychiatry to allow smokers to smoke, keeping the peace wherever possible. Although the last place in 2023 insisted on providing specially-formulated "House Cigarettes", so psychiatry may also have taken control of cigarette manufacturing to some degree.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mnOLUnExHvw&t=1m42s
[0] https://viewfromthewing.com/delta-rarely-interacts-with-cust...
I know this is not the point of the article but why would you take a flight from Geneva to Zurich? It's less than 3h by train, which if you count the time it takes to get to Geneva airport and go through security, probably becomes a much smaller difference.
And for that, you're emitting ~100kg of CO2 [1]
[1]: https://curb6.com/footprint/flights/geneva-gva/zurich-zrh
I've actually done that exact route once, and the train experience was much nicer, and took about the same amount of overall time.
But I still remember most of the lyrics to the Virgin America safety video, and seeing it on flights made me smile (and pay attention). Man, I miss that airline. Alaska, predictably, made it boring and mediocre.