Child restraint seats are welcomed by AA in the non-aisle center section seats of widebodies and any center section seats in J or F:
Originally Posted by aa.com
Seating Restrictions For Child Restraint Devices
May be seated in any window seat of any aircraft except for the following:
designated exit rows
in the row in front or behind the exit rows
May also be seated in any of the following:
any non-aisle Coach Class seat of the center section of a wide-body aircraft
any seat in the center section of First Class on wide body aircraft
any seat in the center section of Business Class
MIAFlyer: I agree with you with most of your post on why kids should face forward or rearward, but one somewhat common scenario you omitted (one which is much more common than a survivable crash) is a rapid deceleration event, like an aborted takeoff. When the pilot stands on the brakes, the forces exerted on an infant's chest (if facing forward) may exceed non-injury levels. I've never been in a survivable crash, but I have experienced somewhat severe turbulence, and several aborted takeoffs.
Given the extremely remote probability of collapsing seats, my advice would be to plan for the more likely events (rapid deceleration) and protect the infant against that risk than focusing on the "survivable crash."
Anyway - no matter the orientation of the seat, no matter what event, children in a car seat are probably gonna fare better than the projectiles held on laps. After all, the FAA is adamant that everyone over the age of two he belted in at various points throughout the flight, but ignores those under two (yes, I'm very familiar with the studies tending to show that families would drive if forced to buy infants under 24 mo a seat of their own). The nanny state ignores those most in need of a nanny - infants under 24 mo - and instead requires FAs to confirm that everyone over 24 mo is wearing their belt when the seat belt sign goes on.
