CZAMFlyer

Oh sure, frequent flyers can recite the safety video by heart while sitting in a nice comfy chair. Go through a very loud and rapid stop in an aircraft that ends up lying on its side in darkness and water, broken in two places, filled with smoke and jostled by screaming passengers - I can almost guarantee most of us will forget nearly everything we've seen in that video 200+ times.

yyz_atc_qq

According to the SD on my flight, the 77Ls get 8 FA's (at least for domestic flights) and they are split 3 in J, 5 in PY/Y but once they hand out the PY meal trays they don't come back to refill drinks or collect trays until after the entire Y cabin is served which on my flight was 2 hours after the trays were delivered. Perhaps our resident expert SD can chime in (if I could remember his handle I'd have tagged him in this post).

She also claimed that the 1 in 50 rule is why the 77Ls get 8 but the 77Ws get 12. I didn't even try to debate how that math doesn't make sense. The 40J 77W has a capacity of 400, so even if infants count in the 1 in 50 rule, at most it would have 9 not 12 that she claimed. The 28J 77W has a capacity of 450, so it would be 9 or 10 again not 12.

Perhaps international flights have a higher compliment to account for increased service levels.... who knows. All I know is if AC wants to charge a premium for PY, they should have 1 FA primarily assigned to that cabin. If 8 is the compliment on a 77L, then it should be split 3/1/4

flyquiet

Actually, she was older than most ACr FAs.

"Let's remember..."? She did not make a special trip to see me. I said she approached me expressly for that purpose, but she simply brought it up when she reached me. It was more like a drive-by on her way to do something else (she had an armload of iPads if I recall correctly). Her mission was detoured because I posed unanticipated problems. "Went out of her way to give [me] individualized attention"? It was far from being individualized attention. I've had individualized attention, and this wasn't it. I did not need an individual safety briefing, but was not offered one, for example.

I do agree, it's not all on her. AC training on how to deal with deaf passengers is wrong, if it is still what I was told by a student who worked as AC FA. The student was told to ask passengers if they can lipread, and my point is that it is wrong. I've volunteered that information to AC on any number of occasions. They are profoundly uninterested in advice on being more accessible. This is not a "single mis-step in all my travels". It's just slightly worse than the norm. Those who have read my previous posts will recall other observations.

However, some other FAs have been capable of having a practical approach because they are human and use logic. One actually knew some fingerspelling. One had a written note to start with. Most are at least able to clue in to the functional significance of deafness much earlier in the dialogue. At the other extreme, there are flights where they never acknowledged they had a deaf passenger, flights when they asked me for information about other random deaf strangers elsewhere on the plane (as though we are all part of some kind of troupe), flights when I have been offered a Braille safety card, or a wheelchair in case I needed the washroom.

I'll give her credit that every subsequent thing she wanted to ask me, she wrote it in full, including all the verbose airline-speak, "have you had a chance to look at today's menu? Is there something you would like?" (This made me think, how simple would it be if they pre-printed those scripted statements on a set of cards, and enabled the FA to show the relevant card? Could even be a solution to their bilingual 7-Up problem.)

canadiancow

But now you're arguing that it's pointless to even HAVE a safety video.

I'm just saying that if I were an FA, and I had two deaf passengers, the E75K is probably not the one I'd be most concerned with.

winnipegrev

The exemption granted by TC for the 1:50 FA ratio originally only applied to narrowbodies, and if I'm not mistaken is still the case. Widebodies are 1:40 and thus the 77L needs 8 and 77W requires 10, 12 if a 450 seater.

With 77Ws rotating around it wouldn't surprise me if domestically all 77W versions are rostered to 12 FAs for coverage due to swaps.

RangerNS

With echos to the "do SE's get greeted by name" thread, that is highly dependent on the SE and what the FA thinks their mandate is.

A subtle hello (maybe even by name!), acknowledgement of status and disability (are we allowed to say that? I can't keep track) and an accurate analysis of needs, real & imagined, from both real and presumed entitlement. That would be a good process apply to everyone.

flyquiet seems humble and more amused than annoyed... but possibly annoyed for others in her troupe not as experienced as she is. Working that angle, if AC can't take care of her, imagine the anxiety (quite possibly to the point of terror) in some deaf FOTSG in the back. Sure, in the moment take care of the FOTSG, but systematically, if you can't take care of the 75k then you've got real problems.

24left

Agree on these points and ^

flyquiet

I can't ever tell, for sure, if I am being greeted by name. (My name that I would recognize for sure is a sign, not something I can hear or see on your face, but you would only know it if you know me. Two people named flyquiet would each have their own name sign.) What is worth a mint to me is securing eye contact before addressing me, and making sure I know you're addressing me. (Many is the time I thought I was being talked to, and it was someone nearby. I've gone to other people's doctor appointments, even.) While I need eye contact, I believe everyone, SEMM to FOTSG, would perceive it as respectful, and hence it would facilitate access and service to all.

And, yes, disability is an appropriate term. Handicap is not. "Special needs" also non-preferred.

yyznomad

I am wondering if those advising you how "it is", or how "it should be" for someone with your disability, have actually experienced your disability.

CZAMFlyer

It's an experience well worth attempting. The members of many prominent organizations (including the employees of an airport you frequent rather a lot) go through it. It's a course entitled RespectAbility, taught by a pair of gentlemen living with disabilities, and consists of exploring the myths and stereotypes surrounding common afflictions, and focuses on the person first, disability second. The material is certainly not sugar coated. It's very worthwhile and a real eye-opener if you're an able-bodied person who takes mobility or reliance on our senses for granted (most of us). Try navigating a familiar airport blindfolded, or in a wheelchair, and see how even well-intentioned offers of assistance can be detrimental if not well thought out.

Er, no, that's not even close to the point I was advancing.

Sometimes I think we forget that AC carried 45 million passengers last year, and yet we expect to be greeted by name and with specific personal information regarding our needs on every flight. It's simply not possible to make 100% of the people happy 100% of the time. Have you considered providing some feedback directly to the airline, offering suggestions on how to improve their approach to deaf customers, or referred AC to a company that focuses on advancing awareness and sensitivity on relating to hearing-impaired people? It's easy to fling turds at a corporation from in front of a screen, but a solution-based approach might actually be more productive. I don't know how much about interacting with deaf people, but asking if they lipread seems like an obvious, and inoffensive, first question.

flyquiet

You're half right.
I'm glad you don't find it offensive, but I do. It dismisses me to the margins of society by pre-empting our preferences about manner of accommodation. If I was under the rubble of a collapsed building, and the good samaritan came along and said "can you lipread?", that would be one thing, but this is a planned, systematic activity with a prescribed procedure, delivered by a big corporation. If you know someone can't hear and possibly can't lipread, why would you seek information from them via the very mechanism that is very likely not to work?
Only 35% of English is visible on the lips. Many deaf people cannot lipread. I am very, very good, and I cannot lipread most of what they ask me on an airplane. You don't need to be worried about the times I say "I don't understand". What you should be worried about the times when I understand and I'm wrong.
The people who are most likely satisfied with this are not deaf people, but rather hard of hearing people with a lot of residual hearing. Because people lump deaf and hard of hearing people together (because we have a common malfunctioning body part) and because hard of hearing people outnumber us 10 to 1, and because HoH people say the things corporations want to hear, a lot of accommodation practices applied to both deaf and HoH people are based on what works for HoH people.
Would it not be easy to have a preprinted card in the Big Book o' PA Scripts saying "how would you like to communicate? can you lipread?" and both show the card and say the same word. Then both lipreaders and non-lipreaders would understand.

Yes. So very many times.
And we don't like "hearing-impaired" either. Both Deaf and HoH people agree on that.

vernonc

So on TPAC PE and then connected to PE YVR-YYZ.
Had a couple of drinks with meal, no issue. Two diff FAs served.
Asked for another drink later on, another FA told me that only the first drink is free. So I paid and had another drink.
Check the AC website and the onboard menu, there is no mention of paid drinks in PE. So what gives ?
I dont care about the $7, just seems weird. Was the FA mistaken or making stuff up to discourage me from drinking.
And before any RCHHMP chime in, I was not drunk, very far from it.

yyznomad

Maybe it was because you were drunk? Hmm?

jc94

As I’m sure my esteemed FOTSG colleague knows, if FAs suspect pax of being drunk they are meant to cut them off. Not charge them.

flyquiet

I had one flight (TPAC, I think) where the PY FA was insistent that drinks were not complimentary. I determined that I was willing to drink it for free but not pay, but passenger behind took up the debate. The menu is clear they are complimentary but they confiscated the menu after meals were ordered and before taking drink orders. After a debate moderated by a senior FA or SD, the FA came back and clarified that the beverages were complimentary. I think they may have more FAs working PY than they have training/experience in the minutiae.