You know, I fully get your concern. I was thinking just such a thing while sitting in an airport not long ago. I have recently begun traveling internationally about twice a year, so I am not a road warrior, but I can negotiate an airport. I am 60, relatively fit, and do extensive research on the ins and outs of flying. I can handle my 50lb check-in bag and can get my carry-on in the overhead. My travel companion, 62, is less fit and has difficulty with bags. Neither of us as any physical issue that gets in the way of flying. However, you need to prepare for battlefield conditions when entering the airport and I can see how a person who is not workout fit and not cognitively clicking on all cylinders could have a major problem. The shear amount of time standing in lines that are slow and hot, signs that could mean anything, kiosks that don't work and when they do are indecipherable, barking TSAs, walks halfway across the airport for a bathroom, standing in a long line and then being told you are in the wrong long line so you have to drag the bags back across the airport to get in the line at the broken kiosk, being told this terminal doesn't have a precheck line so you go outside and walk two terminals down for precheck, then walk back. Juggling passports, boarding passes, IDs and luggage while TSAs scold and there is the constant pressure to hurry, hurry, hurry... And this is if everything goes well. If your transatlantic flight leaves three hours late and you miss your connection...I don't even want to think about it.

The only suggestion I have for older people flying (anyone over 30) is work out so you can handle your bags, get to the airport WAAAAYYYY early so the only rush is self-imposed, practice not becoming flustered when TSAs snarl, and medicate so that you don't start smashing the kiosk that won't work or flipping out while inching forward when you've been in line for an hour and it's 80 degrees, causing you to be thrown out of the airport.