Originally Posted by
Fly Me To The Moon
I did not know that passengers could get assigned cockpit seats now. Is this something new? From overhearing the conversation between the passenger and the flight attendant, I did not get the impression that the passenger was anyone famous or that favors had been pulled.
You must've witnessed an off-duty Cathay crew member flying on an ID ticket. Regular pax cannot, but ID pax can most definitely sit in crew seats OR jump seats (as you witnessed), even if they're not in uniform. For the jump seat it's up to the captain to release it or not, which sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. It's pretty common. I am not sure if non-CX ID pax (for example, a flight attendant's family whom they've signed up for ID90 benefits) can do that, but I know for sure that CX STAFF can fly in jump seats (or crew seats) when they're flying on ID tickets.