For Your Safety Keep the Seat Belt Fastened!

I was wondering if the reason why at least 32 passengers were injured because they did not use their seatbelts. I haven't watched the news this morning but last night's coverage didn't mention a thing about seatbelts!

This violent turbulence should be an example to all who are traveling with children under the age of 2 to buy a seat a separate seat for their child. One's arms are useless for safety restraint during turbulence. They are as strong as spaghetti. Don't gamble with your child's neck being snapped as the child can be torpedoed out of the seat during such turbulence.

I am always amazed at the number of people who take the seat belt off even before the Captain has given permission to move around the cabin. Please tell your son that there are many of us who do NOT do that! I travel some with my 6 and 4 year old granddaughters. My DIL bought them harnesses that fit over the back of the seat, and has shoulder straps for them. The plane seatbelt fits through the harness. They are very comfortable and never even ask to take it off. Gotta teach them young.

Hope many people see your warning and pay attention.
Thanks,
Mimi

FYI- Most FA's do ask people to keep their seatbelts fastened while in their seats, however many people don't listen. My last trip to the West Coast had horrible turbulence for the last hour of the flight and the first indication was a big drop of the aircraft. Luckily most people were wearing their seatbelts but it could have been brutal and not just spilled drinks.

It always amazes me how many people think suggestions or rules are not for them, and just made up to aggravate them. I, on the other hand, have to get up every hour and walk around and sometimes stand for a bit, and I'm nervous the whole time and keeping my hands ready to shoot up and protect my head a little bit. LOL. It's the risk manager in me...

That harness seems pretty interesting...

Thanks, Wray, you've just given me a new reason to be nervous while flying! I've always been more worried about having scalding hot coffee sloshing around the cabin while I'm belted into my seat.

Yep. I always keep mine belted; maybe not always tightened compared with take off and landing. Once, hit bad turbulence. The FA's who were in the aisle trying to get back to the galley were rocking back and forth holding onto seats. I held onto my bottled water - capped. My ginger ale was half full; I held onto that. Sometimes, I get nervous if a person next to me orders red wine or coffee. I hope they are not clumsy in normal flight status, and of course hold onto it during turbo.

Last year when we were flying home from London, the woman across from us didn’t have her seatbelt on and had her seat reclined even before we took off. The FA had her put her seat up, but as soon as the FA turned around, the seat was reclined again. And the FA couldn’t see that her seatbelt wasn’t fastened because she had a sari or pashmina over her. (I could see the end of the seatbelt beside her). If I’m sitting, the seatbelt is buckled.

I see three irrational thought processes from the offenders:

• Hasn’t happened so can’t happen. These are the people that say “I’ve never had a problem with it”. To which I reply “Yet”.

• And a variation on a theme - “the odds are small so the risk is OK”. This is a basic misunderstanding of risk - that it is probability TIMES consequence. They forget that If consequence is bad enough, they still need to mitigate the risk. That’s why the belts. It’s the consequence!

• “It’s my life” which ignores the fact that you could become a projectile and injure someone else’s life.

I had a attendant get really irate with me once when I asked her if it was ok if I got up when the belt signal was on, to use the restroom. She snapped it was at my own risk. Uh, ok. I’m going to seriously wet my pants any minute, of course it’s at my own risk.