Thats because your is drunk as soon as you buy it, other prefer to make it last a bit longer, only what I heard !!!:D:D:D:D

Buying on arrival is better.

Bear in mind that many travellers are also requested to stock up on duty free when travelling to friends and family!

And a far more unusual phenomenon (in my opinion) is those who entirely fill up their allotted 20/23kg baggage allowance when packing for a trip - or even go over and pay extra fees - and then end up using less than half of the items that they packed, having dragged them halfway around the globe with them.

I regulary walk through the AMS baggage hall just when the luggage from some charter destination arrives on belt 1. The pax have spent a week, or at most two, at a casual beach resort in a hot climate, which requires very little in the way of clothing. Yet I see them pile their trolleys high with enormous bags. Never ceases to amaze me.

"The average female needs around 57 items in her suitcase for a two-week holiday, yet many women pack nearer to 150 items, ranging from skirts, tops and underwear to swimwear, high heels and pyjamas. Yet they leave nearly two thirds of the contents of their case unworn."

If this quote is an offense against political gender correctness, then I do not apologize.

Source. Absolutely hilarious!

Johan

It is in the UK... and I thought we were now operating under a uniform air safety regime across the EU, so I'm very surprised by what you are telling me.

This is from CAP789:

+1.

The formal legal requirement in EU-OPS is as follows:
CAP789 is not, strictly-speaking, binding but represents, in the view of the CAA, 'best practice' to comply with EU-OPS. This means that operators can theoretically depart from CAP789 but will then need to provide cogent reasons to show to the CAA's satisfaction how their alternative approach complies with EU-OPS requirements.

In regulatory jargon, CAP789 is a "standard" rather than a regulation: it is not binding as such but complying with it creates a presumption of compliance with the regulation.
The binding instrument in which EU-OPS is contained is Commission Regulation 859/2008

Put another way, the CAA takes the view that the requirement in EU-OPS 1.280 that passengers be seated where they best assist evacuation implies that seats next to emergency exits be occupied during taxi, take-off and landing.
If you are an operator and think that this is not necessary, you will have to persuade the CAA that your way of addressing the issue is just as good as the solution they put forward in CAP789.
So, technically not formally binding but, practically, almost as good as binding.

Each civil aviation authority in the EU will have its own version of CAP789 which will have pretty much the same status but may have different contents depending on how the authority interprets EU-OPS requirements.

"An operator shall establish procedures to ensure that passengers are seated where, in the event that an emergency evacuation is required, they may best assist and not hinder evacuation from the aeroplane."

How vague is that?

One could comply by seating all the aged and decrepit pax as far away from the emergency exits as possible, so they do not slow down the young and nimble as they evacuate the aircraft. Best way to assist an not hinder is to keep out of the way of those who stand a better chance of making it out alive.

Johan

That thought has crossed my mind on more than one occasion.

I was once on a transatlantic flight on which an elderly man needed the assistance of both his younger travelling companion (son?) AND a crew member in order to help him to the toilets. He literally could only go at a snail's pace, and had to stop every few paces for a rest, and yet he made the journey multiple times.

If there had been an evacuation, there was no way I could see him getting out in time.

Everybody knows, and many no doubt prefer not to think about it, but age and infirmity decrease your chances of survival in many emergencies. Fact of life.

Johan

This is par for the course with regulation by reference to standards. The idea is that the binding instrument merely defines safety objectives and leaves it to the standard to define the technical implementation to standards. There can be varying degrees of specification in the regulation but, ultimately, it is not normally meant to be a sufficient document on its own.

Regulation by reference to standards has been pretty much the preferred form of regulation in Europe since the mid 1980s for a variety of reasons, not least to facilitate innovation and adaptation to technical progress: you do not have to change the legislation everytime that we find a better way to address an existing problem or because the way the problem has to be addressed has to change due to technical evolution.


Not really. It is not up to the operator to interpret the requirement as they see fit. They will have to convince the national civil aviation authority that what they propose to do is OK. That is the point of documents like CAP789: they tell you what the expectation of the relevant national authority is.

Isn't there and outfit called EASA somewhere in Frankfurt or so that's supposed to regulate civil aviation EU-wide? Are the national CAAs being obstreperous and resisting harmonization, just like the unions and certain countries have done all in their power to sabotage the Single European Sky ATC scheme?

Johan

EASA does not do everything. Operating licenses are granted at national level, albeit on the basis of rules enacted at EU level. This is pretty much how most regulatory work takes place in the EU: by involvement of actors at both national and EU levels. It is not an issue of aviation authorities being difficult.