Babies up front
 

Ok does anyone else get frazzled when sitting in row 4 and an inattentive mother arrives with her 18 month old, sits down beside me (husband across the aisle)- and then the little cherub proceeds to empty their "non-tippy" cup of orange juice over my Macbook-Pro and Armani pants and then screams loudly for the next 90 minutes, occasionally stopping just long enough to throw a wooden train in my left ear. I was desperately seeking to change my biz class seat for a middle in row 24 between a couple of 250llb fast food junkies. The downside of being EXP!

We are reliably informed that the offspring of all FlyerTalk members behave impeccably on aircraft 100% of the time, so complaining here might make you feel better but will do no good. I must admit wondering, sometimes, what there is about the designation "First Class" that makes AA designate the first row of coach as "Screaming Baby Section".

Sounds rough.


Just be glad that babies likely make up a larger percentage of Y pax then F/J pax.

Upon seeing them board, I would have offered to switch seats with the husband. If he hesitated, a few choice leering glances at his wife along with some suggestive sounds (think Michael Scott) would probably convince him that 4F was likely a better choice for him than 4B.

I don't know, I've been in Y behind the exit row and there seems to be plenty back there as well

Ahaa I thought about that but the husband also had a bouncing bundle of joy on his lap (apparently from a different gene pool as it hardly made a murmur), evidently there is a rule that states you can’t have two lap children sitting side by side as there is only one child emergency air supply mask between two adjoining seats – go figure).

There's the rub. Not enough masks. :(

I'd be in favor of a "lap infant upgrade fee" of $500 or $1,000 to discourage parents from doing this.

My infants saw plenty of F and J but they were always in their own seats, so they never had the opportunity to annoy strangers in adjacent seats as we got wasted on the Glenlivet and ignored the kids.

I have heard of that rule before-only three masks will drop hence no more than 0ne lapchild on each side of the F row. The only thing I never understood is whether oxygen masks are configured late enough in the process of building the plane that they know that it will be a F config because obviously there are at least 4 masks per side in Y rows to accompany a lap child in 3 across seating.

As a father of a newborn (you'll see my of most recent posts have all been in the middle of the night), I find myself totally clueless about what makes my daughter cry. If she's hungry or needs changing, those are easy, but sometimes...no clue. I can assure you that in those cases I'm just as desperate to get her quiet as you would be.

If the kid spilled their juice, I hope the parent was apologetic. If he threw a train at you, totally inappropriate. Screaming and crying -- sometimes not a lot to be done but I hope the parent at least made an effort. You may have avoided some of the inconvenience by switching with the dad but you certainly have the right not to.

That said, we're planning to upgrade just like we normally would on a flight next week (in fact, being up front ensures we have no sick adults next to us and coughing on us the whole flight). We'll bring formula, toys, blankets and anything else to try and keep her quiet but there's always that uncontrollable factor -- just like when an adult has one two many drinks and gets sick on the seats or in the lav 5 feet from everyone else; oh wait, that behavior's probably much more controllable than a newborn.

But wouldn't they be quieter without oxygen?

I don't know why your newborn cries at home, but on the airplane, I can take a pretty good guess. If the newborn is crying while the airplane is boarding, they are tired and cranky. If they start to cry while the airplane is ascending, during flight, or descending, they could be tired and cranky, or else they are unable to equalize pressure of their middle ear to the cabin air pressure. Their eustacian tubes sometimes don't work as well as those of adults. As a scuba diver, I have experienced eustacian tube block, and it feels like someone is driving an ice pick through your eardrums. Infants change pretty rapidly, and just because an infant doesn't cry on one flight doesn't mean they will not cry on the next flight.

I feel so sorry for infants on airplanes that appear to be experiencing this severe pain.

Guess we're getting off topic but we've been told to try feeding her from the bottle on take-off and landing. The swallowing action apparently helps with the pressure changes.

I would agree with OP though that what's most frustrating is parents who seem to have given up or worse, not care, to try and resolve the situation.

I wish they would ban kids under 5 in first class. They certainly can do it. When I used to fly non-rev, AA prohibited employees from wearing denim in first class.

They already have the pop-up for the exit row qualification. How about adding one of those for first class qualification?

It is great to vent, but just recently I had to remind myself sometimes you just have to sit and take it. I had the incessant chatter next to me on my last flight. I was exhausted. My high dollar headphones where left in the rental car. Just not happy. (Un)fortunately my manners prevented me from handling it the way I wanted.

Kids don't bother me as much, I guess I can tune them out. Questions are tougher for me.