blandy62

flew HKG-CDG, sitting on the on a aisle seat and my daughter next to me, it was all right. It probably be a different story if siting next to someone with large shoulder.

Last night NRT-HKG, on a 73Z, seat 40J (bulkhead, middle seat), I could barely fit inside. I am not super skinny, neither fat but I could not fit my hand in between my leg and the seat. For 3.5 hours+, it is ok, but on a longer flight, that would surely become rather uncomfortable after a wife.

percysmith

travelinmanS

Dan needs to find an employer who will pay for business class or at least Premium Economy.

percysmith

What employer pays for home passage these days? I thought these were like colonial-era packages

Visconti

Ah, that looks pretty brutal. Next time, Dude should just pay for an upgrade to at least PE or something.

percysmith

I wonder should CX have a person of size policy if they are going to install 10-abreast seats?

travelinmanS

I don't see any mention of home passage in the post, of course I can't access the link due to my location so I'm not sure if there is more in the facebook link. Anyway, home passage is still common here for expats but it's usually coach. If he's on a package with home passage it's his own fault for not upgrading as I'm sure he has the coin.

sxc

I'm pretty sure he was just on holiday like 90+% of travellers.

percysmith

Can't help myself with a "#MovedBeyond" hashtag

blandy62

I guess this is a real can of worm. But as long as I respect anybody, I pay for one seat and not 80% of one, so airlines should somehow deal with that sort of issue. I really feel for the guy

percysmith

HK GAs confronting an oversized expat? I don't see that happening.

calf613

Was on CX750 from BKK-HKG yesterday. Full flight in Y in 77P configuration (2-3-2 in J, 3-4-3 in Y, no PEY). Wasn't aware that I was going to get the 10-abreast actually, but since it was a fairly short flight (~2 hours flight time), probably would not have changed my decision. This would be an "avoid-at-all-costs" type arrangement if flying Y in long-haul though.

One thing I didn't see mentioned here, the seat stands below the seats in front were laid out in a weird way in the middle section. I'm not sure if it was just my row (52), but the little metal pillars supporting the seats (that typically divide your legroom from your neighbor's legroom) were located down the middle of my seat rather than the typical layout dividing each person's legroom into neat cubby-holes. While it still worked for me by putting one leg on each side of the stand, it removed my ability to fit a bag below the seat, and I ended up having to store my backpack overhead. Seems like they would want to incentivize the opposite (more people putting personal items below the seat) to save space in the overhead bins since as noted here those tend to be more crowded on these flights due to the greater number of Y passengers.

Looking up the flight afterwards, I noticed that this layout adds an additional 40 Y seats to the plane (vs. 9-abreast). My two cents - I get that economics drives the installation of the 10-abreast, and personally I suppose it was fine for a short-haul flight. However, I really cringe at thinking about taking one of these long-haul, I would either try to fly another airline that has more width, or give up and just try to book PEY (which, I know, somehow perversely rewards CX for this behavior - so let's just assume Scenario 1). Since not all of these additional seats end up being used most of the time (I think you need to be at a load factor of 90% for these additional seats to come into play), I have to think that even something like a 5-10% difference in Y pricing would be sufficient to offset the economic disadvantage of flying birds with ~10% fewer seats in Y. I would gladly pay this 10% difference for Y in long-haul if I knew I would be able to avoid 10-abreast, and presumably, there could also be some branding opportunities as well...

I don't know, maybe this is all just wishful thinking...

percysmith

Front cabin of 77P has one more row than old 73Z https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/cath...l#post31829111 , in addition to the additional seat per row.

ernestnywang

I agree. As much as I also don't line the 10-abreast seats, the issue here is policy, not seat width. Even with 9-abreast seats, the same problem could have happened. I think asking for an employer who will pay for a higher class is totally besides the point.

Many years ago, an ISM came over and asked me to swap my exit row seat with a guy who basically couldn't fit in his original seat. I was too naďve and compiled right away without getting any sort of compensation or nice gesture from the ISM. Looking back, I should have complained to CX that they simply should not have let this person board the plane.

fallinasleep

Sadly for Dan Wells, Emirates already has 10 across on their 777s.