20 rows away? Oh, really?

Back in the good ole days, seemed liked the air circulation was much better, in that I don't recall being bothered by smoke coming from one or two rows (in the smoking section) behind me.

I find inconsiderate people passing gas in close proximity to my section far more offensive than smokers.

Kohoutek

Smoking is gross, and doubly gross when subjected against your will in a confined space. I am so glad airlines are smokefree now days.

IRAN AIR does not allow smoking. At least for their fligthts from Iran to DXB and vice versa.

Air China
 

All Air China flights are non smoking. The Japanese carriers were the last ones to allow smoking on "designated smoking flights" in the past, but I do not know if those policies finally changed.

AF used to allow it around 5 years back. But only for a certain time and only in the galley. I can't remember exactly how long as I don't smoke but do remember people smoking when I went to the restroom.

A friend was telling me that even AI used to allow it in Biz and First up until a couple of years back.

As far as smoking in a seat goes, I can remember flying even when I was young and I honestly don't have any memories of people smoking on board. How bad was it? If you were sitting in non smoking could you still smell smoke?

Was it the galley? I thought they had enclosed smoking cubicles - fumoirs

The smoking sections were not enclosed, so if you were sitting in a non-smoking seat a row or two away from the smoking section then you might as well have been sitting IN the smoking section. And then you had some airlines (I believe LH was one of them) that put smokers on one side of the aircraft and non-smokers on the other.

If you weren't sitting immediately adjacent to a smoking section then it was like being in any other place where smoking is allowed. The smell was there, but we didn't notice it as much as we do now because we were more used to it. Once you get used to clean air it's difficult to go back into smokey environments.

By Galley I meant the place in the middle of Economy where the FA's stand. Where all the food & drink is kept.

I remember they had curtains on both sides to contain the smoke.

Couldn't they have just put the vents on SUCK instead of BLOW? ;)

(bonus points for anyone who gets this 80's movie reference)

This is an Australian TV commercial from Cathay Pacific promoting non-smoking flights to the UK back in 1994. They don't make airline commercials like these any more!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7B6xws-zf0

that's easy, it's spaceballs...i have a memory of there be smoking on El-Al back in the 97-98 timeframe but my memory may be deceiving me

This is entirely possible. Most airlines went non-smoking in the mid to late 1990s - some earlier, some later.

I remember being on a smoking flight on KLM in late 1996 - they had run out of non-smoking seats when I checked in and I kicked up such a fuss that they upgraded me to Business Class in the end. I believe they went non-smoking in 1997.

Pilots smoke on Chinese Flights
 

I've had a few instances in the past on Chinese flights where Pilots were obviously smoking in the cockpit:td:. I was sitting in 1st class and you could smell the stench and then see the cloud of smoke as they opened the door.

As of 2005, Cubana still allowed smoking on some flights. There don't seem to be any references to it on their web site.

Of course, smoking is still unofficially allowed on some airlines if you pass the F/A a few bucks -- I've heard this happens regularly on Aeroflot.

My last smoking flight was on US Air flying PHL-ORY in 1994 -- at the time, international flights still allowed smoking. I was in the non-smoking section, but some people were smoking some really nasty French cigarettes. Having the air nozzle blowing directly on my face helped.

To answer your question OP. I pulled up the websites of the airlines that had them and called the others listed that supposedly allowed smoking. The answer from each and every one of them is:

No Smoking on ANY airline today!

Now bribes might be YMMV :)

Is there a law that stopped airlines from offering smoking seats on their flights or was it just a joint decision?