I have a relative who used to work for American, so I had the opportunity to fly on standby for a few years (D2 for anyone who plays the nonrev game). They have reciprocal agreements with a bunch of airlines around the world.
I was flying Iberia from Tel Aviv to Madrid once and just barrrrrrrely managed to squeeze on a flight. It was a 6am flight that I assumed would be empty but happened to get overbooked because of another canceled flight, so all those magical empty seats vanished before my eyes.
They managed to squeeze me on in one of the flight attendant jump seats - not the one in the cockpit, but the super uncomfortable vertical half-seats at the front of the plane. The only other standby passenger was the husband of one of the flight attendants.
Right after we took off, his wife came up to both of us and said “hey it’s 6am, you guys look tired - do you want to sleep in the crew rest?” I mean, why not?
So he took the bottom bunk and I took the top one - I think this was an A330 or 340 — it wasn’t nearly as fancy as the 787 here, but it was damn cozy. Pitch black, full lay flat, and I slept the whole 5 hours like it was 5 minutes.
Later a few friends told me this was absurdly against every regulation and that I basically had a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But I guess shrug Iberia Airlines, eh?
Holy shit! I hoped no one ever mentions it again. Corporate would have complete shitshow if they figured out who gave access. There is a reason they don't even allow non-working crew back there and crew safety is the #1. Could you imagine the shitshow if any passenger got back there and assaulted one of the crew.
You just don’t understand how things really work at the rest of the world. Yes, corporate would be mildly unhappy, but they know that it happens all the time. Notice that they got on the plane on “stand-by” without available seats in the first place! So while technically it was against regulations, things like this happen all the time in less regulated countries.
Getting the jump-seat while flying non-rev is typical, though, and not against any rules. Besides it's not like they could hide that from the corporate if the numbers of passengers was greater than the regular seats available.
There’s a big difference between American Federal law where the Feds are in charge of enforcing Federal law and the States are in charge of enforcing their own laws; and Pan-EU laws where a law is really an agreement to pass a bunch of laws by the member nations who then enforce them using whatever enforcement mechanisms they have. By passing the agreement as laws through their own legislatures, they in effect become a part of each member nation’s national laws. As far as I know there’s no EU FBI/DEA and the closest agency to it is more like Interpol.
See also the kerfuffle between Apple, Ireland and the EU where the EU went after both Apple and Ireland to get the Irish to enforce some European agreement that may or may not have prohibited whatever Irish tax regime was (is?) in place.
> Pan-EU laws where a law is really an agreement to pass a bunch of laws by the member nations who then enforce them using whatever enforcement mechanisms they have. By passing the agreement as laws through their own legislatures, they in effect become a part of each member nation’s national laws
These types of EU laws are called EU directives, which as you described first need to be "transcribed" into national law by the respective parliaments. As a result they don't go into into force in all member states at the same time, and there is some more leeway concerning their implementation.
However, there are also EU regulations, which are immediately binding in all member states in their original form as soon as they are passed by the EU, much like US federal laws.
It is true though that even for EU regulations, the EU generally does not have their own enforcement capability and so there can still be differences from state to state on how strictly regulations are interpreted.
The GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) is an example of the latter kind of law, btw.
I guess it's probably not that much about assault (it would be anyway only for "trusted" people like spouse of crew, member of the airline?), but could probably be more about dealing with flight procedures: how do you handle turbulences while in there, how do you handle an emergency, wake up before landing, ... Flight attendants will be busy in the main area in those situations and it would be difficult to take care about non-trained passengers in those spaces (small space, small stairs, ...). It seems for example that they have special breathing equipment there, maybe not like in the seated area: you'd have to know how to use it...
Either the crew director didn't know or they didn't care but letting anyone into the crew rest area 100% get's you fired in most airlines. Airlines already have enough problems with passengers fornicating in the lavatory, if they knew there was a dark, secluded room with beds aboard just adds a whole other layer of liability.
For another, it they're doing it right (not just for a checkmark on a list) then there is a non-insignificant chance of being heard. That makes other passengers uncomfortable.
My separation flight, returning CONUS from Pearl Harbor, was a late night 747 to SFO. New Years Eve of the millenium, so most people were already where they were going to be on earlier flights. I had an entire mid-plane six-seat row to myself, threw on two seatbelts since I know I roll when I sleep, and caught 9 hours over the Pacific.
8 years ago I flew PMO-LIN on an (Alitalia) A320 at 6 am, only six passengers on board including me.
Just before falling asleep I managed to see the sun rising on the quietest flight I've ever taken. Just one and half an hour, but it felt like I had never slept before :D
Incidentally, that was the trip that actually started my career as a developer.
I'm so jealous of people who can sleep on long distance flights. When the lights turn off, most people seem to have no issue falling asleep and then wake up several hours later. Meanwhile I have to stare at the window for all those hours. I can try to sleep, but I won't fall asleep anyway, no matter how tired I am.
If you want to be polite it's probably worth telling the crew to wake you if you snore.
And before the anyone tries to swoop in and score virtue points by linking to some study about how alcohol reduces "muh quality REM sleep" I'd just like to remind everyone that the alternative here is not sleeping on your flight.
I snore so loudly that I just can't sleep on a plane at all without feeling like a jerk. I fell asleep at SFO after coming back from Paris once and everyone was laughing at me.
Some random, maybe useful info. The mouthpiece works by preventing the jaw from recessing back. From my pre-purchase research I found out there are 2 main causes for snoring, this works for one of them.
Before the first use you put the mouthpiece into very hot water, bite it with jaw going forward, then let it cool down. You can reshape it the same way later in case the fit is not good enough. This was the case with me - I was waking up with a totally sore jaw (too much forward shift). After the reshape it is much better.
People report it is possible to make it possible to breathe through the mouthpiece. I found it unnecessary - maybe it even improves the airflow through the nose (I am not sure - could be placebo).
Googleable keywords is "mandibular advancement device". Good luck.
This is awesome info. My dentist was already recommending a dental guard since I apparently grind when I sleep - but those are crazy expensive compared to what I'm seeing elsewhere now.
I usually fall asleep during taxi. It’s one of the reasons I don’t like driving a car, anything that moves makes me sleepy. I can sleep in cars, trains, buses & boats without a problem, even if I wasn’t tired before.
Before kids I would semi-frequently fall asleep while taxiing and wake up when landing. It almost felt magical when that happened, like travel was instantaneous.
Pre-pandemic I would fly from Boston to India via Dubai six to eight times a year. It takes about 22 hours or so including layover. I take an Ambian an hour or two into the Boston-Dubai leg and with that I can sleep for seven hours or so. Before that I might be able to sleep for an hour if I was lucky. It really makes a huge difference.
Yup that's what I do too, better living through chemistry - I also split really long flights in two, spend the day somewhere in the middle and sleep two nights on the plane.
Don't make the mistake I did of taking them before take-off ... and then have the plane discover a fault on the runway ....
I sleep better on flying planes than on the ground. It's possibly the humming and the calming effect induced on me. Somehow I think this is a learned experience but I may be wrong. I just imposed on myself to be relaxed as I used to be very anxious and tense when I was flying. A few times of trying this and now I fall asleep as soon as the plane takes off and many times I skip the meals offered on the plane altogether because I'm deeply asleep. I somehow associated the experience of flying with something very relaxing that my such that body anticipates the flight, I already start yawning when I'm boarding the plane.
Same here, what a nightmare it is to take those long flights. I once waited 9 hours at an airport for a 12 hour flight; seldom been more exhausted than that. It wasn't even the last leg, so even more airports/waiting when we arrived.
Is there a worse place to wait than those airports? The shops sell Rolex watches, Hugo Boss suits, alcohol (let me lug some bottles of vine/booze across the globe to save $12) + perfume. Obviously some overpriced cafe's and restaurants there as well, but not exactly a cool place to "hang out".
Especially in the smartphone era, I actively enjoy having a couple hours to kill in an airport. I make sure that I have a range of activities to do depending on energy level (writing about my research / hacking on something / reading nonfiction / reading a "brainless" book / surfing through HN or reddit), have pre-meditated that it's okay to pay airport prices on a fancy coffee drink or a beer or whatever, have pre-meditated that I should have no expectations about productivity, and then just hunker down in a chair with my computer/phone/book and a drink and chill out. It feels very removed from the pressures of everyday life, which I like—I wouldn't be able to chill half as well if I were at home and felt like I was supposed to be doing something more important.
On an airplane you lose the internet, but the same general strategy works for me. Re. sleeping, it works for me to sleep when I'm able to and say "well if you can't sleep right now, read your book. Oh, you're too tired to read your book? Maybe it's time to sleep"
Flew from Seattle to Frankfurt last year in economy select which was current us first class seats. Had just enough internet to docs and a small amount of slack (1 active convo). Got so much work done reviewing docs and COEs while watching a movie on the pull out tv (bulkhead) aka laptop dual monitor. Would do again. Solstice so light the entire flight over the artic
There are also the stories of the people who have lived for months in airports. I guess you are lucky it was "only" 9 hours, but yeah, it doesn't sound pleasant.
> I guess you are lucky it was "only" 9 hours, but yeah, it doesn't sound pleasant.
We were in Caracas; so we were advised not to go into the city. It became a 9 hour stint at Burger King pretty much, which is enough.
If you look at long airports visits from a "survival" aspect, it's probably quite nice. Or at least compared to being on the "Alone" show; but certainly not something I'd recommend :-)
I've spent some time in a VIP lounge once (it may have been for a train ride to Paris for which the first class ticket was just as expensive as a regular one), came on time on purpose just to sit there for a change :p. It was quiet, empty, you got offered a drink, etc. If it was a long layover, sleeping was likely an option, and with the attendant there you could ask them to wake you up if there was an issue with the flight. But, theoreticals; flying first class is 3-6x as expensive and I'm not convinced it's worth it.
As a regular pleb who has only ever flown coach, I'm feel like first class is mostly people for whom the alternative is private/charter— viewed through that lens, it's a huge discount, and the extra perks are small compensation for hassles like abiding by someone else's schedule, having to use a major rather than regional airport, and needing to go through regular security (even with getting to use the priority queue).
Most of the people sitting in first class and using the lounge are frequent business travelers on upgrade. I've had lounge access a few times because my father in law used to travel from California to Asia every other month for a large part of his career, so now he has lifetime lounge access and can bring guests. Sometimes when we travel together some of us get bumped up to first. And when my dad was flying cross country every week for work, he was almost always sitting in first class on upgrade.
But we're definitely not going to be flying private. :)
Depends on the airport and lounge, but you can often buy your way in for $30-$40. As the food and alcohol are free, it’s not a bad deal if you’re hungry and thirsty but not picky.
Plus it’s a bit more secure so you can feel less worried about sleeping and your luggage going missing.
If you’re lucky, there might not even be any babies or children.
I've only been to those a couple of times but they make all the difference. The relaxed atmosphere, the ability to take a shower/nap/drink makes you almost want to hang out at the airport.
I think 3x as expensive is still worth it for long haul flight. One business seat space equal to about 3 economy seat space and you also got lounge access and priority checkin.
My friends tease me that this is one of my (few) superpowers - I can sleep comfortably for 5+ hours on long-haul flights in coach.
Honestly, it's been a trial-and-error process. I discovered a few things that work for me (YMMV, of course):
* Length of flight helps. I NEVER could sleep on international flights to Europe when I lived in NYC, because those flights were ~6-7 hours, which is, I think, the worst possible length for sleeping. By the time dinner service is done and the lights are out, there's about 3-4 hours of solid quiet time before they start prepping for breakfast/coffee service. Not enough. When I moved to SF, the 10-12 hour flights to Europe turned out to be the perfect length.
* Time of flight helps. The best possible flight for sleeping for me are the 7pm departures out of SFO that land in Europe 10-12 hours later. That's basically normal sleep time for me, so my body is actually in sync with the flight.
* Supplements help. The magic combo for me is 3mg of melatonin + 1 glass of red wine :)
Re: supplements, there are a few to stay away from.
Ambien has costarred in a few of those "I'm sorry, they did what?" stories. It can make your behavior random if you don't fall asleep quickly or get woken early.
There was a period of time in my life when I could reliably fall asleep before take off and not wake up until after landing. Key points are to not recline your seat and make sure your seatbelt is visibly buckled so nobody wakes you up.
Same. I've never slept on one of these. It makes flying from the US west coast to Europe particularly unpleasant, as those flights usually arrive in the morning/early afternoon of the next day.
It's magical. I once fell asleep before takeoff (which I've never been able to do since), and woke up exactly as the plane landed, some 7 hours later, and it felt like I had been teleported.
It's the reason that I fantasize about planes one day offering real beds — or at least seats that can be put (in economy class, mind you) into a flat position.
I managed this once on a 14hr long-haul from London to Vancouver (refuel in Goose Bay, because it was a a cheap flight!). Other than the refuel land/takeoff, I slept the entire flight.
But only because I had only just started my paid career as a software engineer, my boss had gone on vacation leaving me to run the computer systems at a multinational research facility, and I had worked for 72 hours without any sleep right before leaving :)
I don't think we'll ever get bunk planes as long as revenue maximization is at the core of the airlines' operations.
Taking a look at the front cross section showing "Wing Flex in flight" is interesting. I had no idea the carbon composite wings flexed so much that the wingtips are higher than the main body of the plane during flight.
It's flex or break. The wings hang from the plane body when it is on the ground. But when it is in the air the plane body hangs from the wings. That's a large amount of weight. It also shows you just how much lift those tips generate.
I just experienced those! In March I was flying MUC->SFO (the day before Trump "closed the borders", lucky timing for me). Due to COVID the plane had been downgraded from an A380 (which I was excited to try out, since I'd never been on one) and instead was a smaller Airbus which was also new to me. First time I went to the bathroom I was totally caught off guard. No idea this was a thing, had never even heard of it.
So novel that I took pictures to show my friends when I got back in the ground :-)
The A340 I flew also had the toilets downstairs on the cargo level. A stair would lead to a small hallway with 7 toilets. I quite liked the arrangement.
The A340 was the first plane where I became aware of the crew rest, because there was a downstairs area with passenger lavatories and also the crew rest behind another door, it was labeled as such.
It's a weird layout though, because in order to make headroom for the downstairs, it blocks out some seats 'upstairs'.
Would it make you feel better if I said I don't particularly like this particular aircraft and the alternatives are so much better?
There are entire websites dedicated to helping you find a flight on a particular aircraft because some passengers know the difference between a good aircraft and flying rattle can.
I'm not so surprised that a passenger would have a preference on the model of plane, although "hate" seems like an extreme overstatement.
I'm confused about why you'd care about an amenity that's purely for the crew. It's not obvious how anything about it could affect you while flying, especially its location in the aircraft.
What's the problem with the air that is specific to the A340?
Air from the outside is dry, and there are strategies to mitigate this. One of them is recirculation, and in some cases, humidifiers. But my understanding is that recirculation is controlled by the crew, and humidifiers are an option the airline may or may not take.
Unless an airplane has a condenser of some sort, and I don't know any plane that does that, there is no magic. Moisture has to come from inside the plane, either though passengers breathing (that's the idea with recirculation) and/or heavy onboard water tanks (humidifier).
> It’s amazing what you’ll find up here. There are smoke detectors, fire extinguishers, flashlights and portable oxygen containers for use in an emergency. There are also comfort items, such as power outlets, a small mirror, coat hooks and a phone to call the other flight attendant stations.
I feel like that's stretching the term 'amazing' to beyond breaking point. Mandatory safety equipment! Small mirror!
A couple of years ago I was on a flight from Paris to Newark. Having had left Ireland behind us already (after maybe 2 hours of flight time), the pilot told us that the air condition in the crew rest wasn't working, so the crew was unable to get proper sleep. Unable to fix it in flight, but not an outright emergency, they had to turn around and we went right back to Paris.
That's how I learned about this magical place's existence, and that you aren't allowed to make a 8.5h flight when it's broken, even if the rest of the plane is perfectly fine.
I wonder if that’s a sanitized version of the story that’s more like: “we wouldn’t be able to takeoff again without this getting fixed and we don’t have a maintenance base in Newark, so we’ll just go back and hope nobody files for compensation.”
Of course you can get compensation (if you ask), and the crew doesn't care either way - it's not like it comes out of a bonus they would have gotten or something. Flying is not a comfortable job and if passengers expect a/c on a flight I think it's reasonable for the crew to expect it from their employer as well.
The pilot has to follow corporate policy though. (Not continuing to Newark is not a safety issue.)
I've been in the same situation, and the first officer said as much to us. "Sorry, this is EasyJet, so we fly back to Gatwick where we have our spare plane and maintenance people. BA would have a spare pilot and a spare plane, and would fly that out with the spare parts and maintenance people to meet this one."
Hah, I remember a BA flight (on which I was thankfully not on) which decided to return back to Heathrow 6 hours into a 12 hour flight to Tokyo for that exact reason.
Imagine flying 12 hours in a plane only to be back where you started.
The exception proves the rule, perhaps? EasyJet doing this wouldn't make the news.
After the first officer returned to the cockpit, some of the other passengers on my EasyJet flight complained to the cabin crew. They said things like "it will be fine, standard procedures, happens all the time".
I would immediately spend the next 2 hours flying back figuring out how to file for compensation, and maybe helping others on board go through the process as well.
In this case there was plenty time to consider how to apply for compensation: in the 2 hours flying back the way we came, in the hour waiting for the luggage, in the three hours in the line with the other passengers to be booked on another flight, in the hour in the airport shuttle going to the hotel for the night, and another going back to the airport the next morning, in the two hours in the queue for the re-check-in. Also in the two hours in the plane the next day til the turnaround point, hoping to make it a bit further this time around.
Turns out, if you dump a plane with 350 people suddenly onto the three customer service people serving at CDG for United, it becomes quite the shit show. I doubt any of the crew would have preferred this option over continuing to fly to Newark as intended, if they were remotely friendly with the ground crew, or had to serve there themselves.
Fun part was the passengers for other flights walking into the terminal and gazing at the queue of 350 people wrapping around one of these giant blocks at CDG, in wonder. Mood of the people in the queue was not that of the highest enjoyment, though.
If my experience with multiple different "oh, sorry, no flight tonight" is anything to go by the ground staff are always completely unprepared for the process of putting people into a hotel. It's as if nothing like this has happened before in the entire history of the airline.
You'll have a massive queue with some harried staff member hastily scanning the 3-ring binder seemingly trying to reinvent the process from first principles. The whole process seems to kick off when the first passenger hits the counter, too - not, say, when the airline first knows that this situation is inevitable.
I think they are always hoping for a miraculous save ("It turns out half the passengers have old friends in the city they want to overnight with, and the other half got on to other flights with 10 minutes notice, hooray!").
Or maybe more selfishly, hoping their shift will end and they can go home before the plane gets back.
I worked at a company that had this kind of situation once. The product was in shambles, but the shit hadn’t really hit the fan yet. I didn’t want to deal with it, so I did the minimum, collected my paycheck, dodged the issues as much as I could, and finally got out just in time. Literally it felt like the entire building was detonating behind me in a massive explosion as I put on my sunglasses and walked to my car for the last time. Did not look back. Lived to code another day.
That’s the thing, if they paint it as something non-controllable, you may think you can’t get compensation. Or you’ll get stone-walled in trying to figure out the real reason.
For most airliners, it is allowed for crew to take 'companion' passengers, like friends or family on a flight. The companion must still pay for the ticket, but it is usually sold with a hefty discount.
Companions also have no guarantee of a seat, if the flight is overbooked, you're out of luck. But.... on most flights it is allowed to have more passengers than seats, this all has to do with regulations on cabin-crew members vs number of passengers. So, it is not unusual for companions to sit in the cabin or cockpit jumpseat, or, you guessed it, the crew rest. As long as the regulations allow this of course.
I have flown many times as a companion, mostly in smaller planes (that do not have a crew restroom), but also a couple of times in a 747, which have crew rests in the cockpit (2 full-size bunkbeds, and 2 business class seats and a bathroom).
I asked about it on a 787 Flight I had last year and crew member was nice enough to show it to me after the flight. It's very cosy. Unfortunately they have special emergency hatches that you need to be certified to operate, so unless you are certified, there is no chance of ever been able to sleep in one during flight. (I have flown first class, and given the option I would take the crew bunks for sleeping.)
The 787 just started flying my predominate route (MIA-LHR) right before COVID so I haven't had a chance to fly on it yet. I've been on the 747-400 for years (decades it feels like) and know a little about the cabin crew rest area for that model. Unlike the 787, the 747 crew rest has bunk beds and the flight crew rest is in the cockpit where the old engineer's station used to be (who's been replace by more advanced engine computers).
There is usually 2 business class seats reserved for flight crew. I had a memorable flight one Christmas where I was bumped but the captain gave up his rest seat for me (the spouse of one of the working cabin crew).
When it comes to airline union contracts any and everything is negotiable, so rest areas and crew seats may simply not exist if things continue the way they are going.
Crew rest areas will always be around because the planes now have a range that exceeds the maximum on call time for a flight crew. For some long-haul routes it is not possible to make the flight on a single crew without breaking various laws and regulations.
Looks like many of these occupy less saleable space than business-class seats would. If the plane has space in the roof/cellar, you get 6 beds for the space of a ladder.
I would bet that since these are only for crew they can also put them in places that are more 'unsafe' than general passenger seating. (At least in terms of exit paths and safety regarding getting bumped around during heavy turbulence.)
Yes, with conditions. That’s answered toward the end of the article, along with a picture of old business class seating and some terms to continue web searching (class 1, class 2).
From what I understand the real reason this or equivalent layouts haven't happened is emergency exit times. I think the current requirement is that everybody can at least theoretically get off the plane in 90 seconds, and tightly-packed bunks inflate that time compared to seats.
I have to figure that those times are pretty contrived. Maybe you can evacuate in 90 seconds, if all of the "passengers" are skinny and athletic, and know what's going to happen, and don't have any extra stuff to try and grab, and there's no fire or smoke, etc.
All that makes it a little hard to say what the real effect is. It would probably be a bit slower, but I bet with all of the optimizations for their 90 second test evacuations, the all-bed-plane could still evacuate faster than a plane-full of real passengers.
I guess there's just nobody ambitions enough around to try something really new.
I have the same impression from videos like [1] but I suppose that is all that is needed to certify the aircraft. It may not happen in the "real world", you never know how everyone in a plane of hundreds passengers will react, but the design of the plane has to allow it to be "possible".
Back in grad school, one of my friends was married to a gentleman who was a pilot in the Air Force and his job was flying aerial refuelling tankers (aka KC-130s).
I learned two interesting facts from him:
- Even with the "War on Terror" going on in full swing, Air Force pilots were under the same FAA crew rest procedures as commercial (e.g. Delta, United etc) aviators
- In the event that a hostile air force was targeting the AWACS (giant airborne RADAR platforms), the combat air traffic controllers would route the KC-130s in between the attackers and the AWACS. The idea was that the attackers would be confused and take out the tankers instead. The thinking here was that losing a tanker (essentially a giant flying gas can) was more acceptable than a complex electronics platform filled with specialists. Makes sense but still sobering from the perspective of the tanker crew.
> Even with the "War on Terror" going on in full swing, Air Force pilots were under the same FAA crew rest procedures as commercial (e.g. Delta, United etc) aviators
Only one pilot is flying for the majority of the flight. The pilot not flying is resting, and the switch off as required, and only have both pilots on during the most dangerous parts of flight: takeoff, landing, and in vicinity of the target.
That said, for USAF purposes, crew rest isn't during flight:
> Crew rest is compulsory for aircrew members prior to performing any duties involving aircraft operations and is a minimum of 12 non-duty hours before the flight duty period (FDP) begins. [0]
If they're in flight, it's "Controlled Cockpit Rest"
> That said, for USAF purposes, crew rest isn't during flight
So... it isn't the same as FAA is it? Because crew rest is during the flight for the FAA - hence the whole point of the article, which is about crew rest stations on the aircraft, not before.
On the one hand, AWACS has a giant round protruding antenna that makes it instantly recognizable in any photograph. On the other hand, you would probably engaging any aircraft at sufficient distance that you might not be able to make out many details about it.
The missiles can get confused by chaff and flares. They're not gonna be able to do a very good job telling the difference between a 767 and 707 under combat conditions.
It probably varies greatly based on whether you're sitting on the ground firing SAMs based on RADAR returns or looking out the canopy of a pointy-nosed jet. Although if you're that close to a fat target, you've probably basically won the engagement.
Yeah, but the Air Force doesn't fly KC-130s. They do fly KC-135s, and C-130s, but there's no point for adding the KC package on for the Air Force. Everything the USAF wants to refuel is fast enough that the KC-135s are a better plane for the USAF.
The funny thing is, in any other industry being told to take a break in such a small enclosed space would be brutal. On an airplane having space like that to lay down is absolutely bourgeoisie!
I’m absolutely certain it must be possible to give everyone a bed onboard a flight. I’d take it over a seat even if I couldn’t sit up fully, you could pay by volume coffin -> suite.
These pods are optional extras when fitting new aircraft. They are normally only installed on aircraft meant for long hauls. So you wont see many of them in places like the US where the longest flights are rarely over five hours.
I realize that certifying DC electronics for airplane use is an expensive and complicated process. But I do wonder what the situation is for built-in USB charging ports up there.
I have a relative who used to work for American, so I had the opportunity to fly on standby for a few years (D2 for anyone who plays the nonrev game). They have reciprocal agreements with a bunch of airlines around the world.
I was flying Iberia from Tel Aviv to Madrid once and just barrrrrrrely managed to squeeze on a flight. It was a 6am flight that I assumed would be empty but happened to get overbooked because of another canceled flight, so all those magical empty seats vanished before my eyes.
They managed to squeeze me on in one of the flight attendant jump seats - not the one in the cockpit, but the super uncomfortable vertical half-seats at the front of the plane. The only other standby passenger was the husband of one of the flight attendants.
Right after we took off, his wife came up to both of us and said “hey it’s 6am, you guys look tired - do you want to sleep in the crew rest?” I mean, why not?
So he took the bottom bunk and I took the top one - I think this was an A330 or 340 — it wasn’t nearly as fancy as the 787 here, but it was damn cozy. Pitch black, full lay flat, and I slept the whole 5 hours like it was 5 minutes.
Later a few friends told me this was absurdly against every regulation and that I basically had a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But I guess shrug Iberia Airlines, eh?