fly18725

See UA 232 - at least one infant died because of the lack of restraints.

fastair

And on the exact same flight, another survived because of it. Infant was thrown free from mother, who died, infant was unharmed. Statistical evidence goes both ways on this dispute a vocal group of people that lobby.

Marilu

Sadly, infant injuries and deaths have not been zero. There is a reason the NTSB wished to have the rules changed. I researched the topic and found several incidents of lap children, both belted (tethered) and unbelted either being seriously injured or dying during accidents or severe turbulence where everyone else survived or were relatively unscathed.

I did this research after a Lufthansa crew insisted that I install the car seat facing forward with my newborn in it. Anyone with children these days knows that is absolutely wrong and dangerous, and that infant car seats should always face rearward, even on an aircraft, per manufacturer's instructions (until they reach a certain size/age, but certainly for young infants). The FA's reasoning was that all passengers must face forward for take off and landing. Because it is impossible to properly secure the seat facing forward and the fact that it would cause serious injury to a fragile newborn in the event of an accident, I refused and the FA took away the car seat and gave me one of those infant belts that loop onto the adult's belt to use instead.

Lufthansa later apologized, but this goes to show that Flight Attendants are not all-knowing, even when it comes to their own airline's rules, and they are people too, and they can lie. In the case of this Canadian singer, other passengers back up her version of events. None have come out to back up the FA's version having the kid running wild in the aisle.

eng3

Isn't a child in a car seat (even facing forward) safer than a child in an infant belt (also facing forward)? You refused, but in the end you still didn't get your way (rear facing), so I would have settled for the lesser of two evils (forward facing car seat.
Note I havent actually done research on any of this, I'm just assuming car seat is usually safer than belt loop.

Marilu

It is impossible to secure facing forward. The seat just slides forward, unrestrained. I even demonstrated how it just slid around, but both the FA and head purser insisted "all passengers" must face forward. I refused to face it forward because since it slid forward, in the event of impact, the plane's seat belt was directly in line of my baby's neck. A severe impact would have caused the belt to cut into her neck as the car seat slid forward with my baby strapped into it. The plane's seat belt would not go anywhere. Not sure if my explanation is clear, but the bottom line is that it would have caused a decapitation.

You can also view safety videos on youtube explaining that the whiplash forces on an infant can cause an "internal decapitation" where the spine separates from the head due to the fragile nature and mechanics of an infant's body. Their heads are enormous relative to their bodies, not to mention extremely fragile. Very young infants don't even have the muscle development to hold their heads up. (This scenario is different from my own with the seat belt cutting into the neck). There are forward-facing car seats, but those are for older children.

But you're right. The infant belt loop thing is not safe, either. You can imagine the forces on the infant's fragile body and spine with the infant being thrown and jerked around in an accident or turbulence, if not crushed by the adult in the first place, as has happened. It's simply not safe.

eng3

Ah I see. I recall my sister being told the same thing (I know she wasn't happy about it) but she was able to secure her car seat facing forward somehow without sliding. Must have been some sort of design difference in that seat. I wasn't there to witness, just heard the story. I know her seat is designed to be turned around (in the car) once the child is older though. I think there's another thread about this very topic too

spin88

Actually (as I found in a quick search) there were 4 lap kids (w/o) seat belts, only one died. That is 1 in 4 survival rate. Given that of the 294 other assigners 110 died, the lap kids did as well (actually better) than the non-lap passangers.

Plus, I might add, its very hard to see belted vs. non-belted being the cause or not cause of anything given the scope of that crash and that most passengers died of smoke inhalation.

LaserSailor

See the >30000 auto deaths in the US each year and estimate how many more would there be if kids under 2 had to have tix

In a plane, No. In a car, yes. You are mitigating two different risks in air and car travel. To be blunt, you don't survive a plane crash, the danger is projectile. The forces you are mitigating are perpendicular to normal motion in air travel. In car travel, that's not the case.

fastair

I've calculated the same figures before but didn't publish them as location on aircraft had a more significant cause/effect relationship than own seat/not. As for the flight attendant who has made a crusade due to the one that didn't make it, I understand, for her it's personal and emotional vs fact/statistic based. I try not to argue with emotional people as no matter what facts are presented, they rarely consider anything beyond their emotions. This isn't to say that o think seat belts and individual seats/car seats are a bad idea, just that the most vocal person in the recent past on this topic has a view biased by personal experience.

fly18725

As noted later, it's difficult to draw a correlation between lap infants and fatalities as, a) incidents with selective fatalities are rare, and b) there are other factors that more significantly impact survival in an incident.

Regardless, there have been injuries and fatalities with lap infants that could have been prevented if a child was secured in a seat. I understand the argument that its relatively safe to hold a small child and that's how my kids preferred to fly when they were <6 months old. On the other hand, if you're going to let a kid sit on a parents lap, why bother with seat belts for other passengers? The risk of injury is much, much better than in a car.

goalie

TOPIC CHECK

Please discuss the subject of this thread. Talk about who should wear a seatbelt, what age they should wear said seatbelt, accident fatalities and etc are discussions for another forum

goalie
UA Forum Co-Moderator

Tchiowa

So when I fly a UA codeshare on NH from NRT to BKK and something happens, it's UA's fault? Even though there is no UA person on the plane. How about if an FA does something wrong to 2 adjacent passengers. One on a UA code share the other on an NH ticket. I don't mean "who writes the compensation check" I mean which management team is responsible for the bad behavior?

If you go to the McDonalds in my neighborhood and slip on the sidewalk you don't get to sue McDonalds corp.

fly18725

I think there's a distinction between codeshare and capacity purchase agreement. A better analogy may be Starbucks. The corporation is ultimately accountable for the quality of franchised locations, such as those located at an airport, but not for other retails stores that brew Starbucks coffee.

jetaway96

During the phrase of taxi, take off and landing, the lap child has to be held on your lap. There are times that I see them throwing fit and the mother/father let them slide down to the space in front of them during taxi. It's a no. We all know that traveling with kids is hard. There are many times that I come and remind the passengers of the rules and leave it as that as they are advised of the regulations. I'm not there to police anyone unless it is obvious that your action would affect someone else. However, if the child is in the isle during taxi, I have no choice but to reinforce it.

ODTheATC

Had family travelling on this flight. They texted me the following:

"I gotta say though, the kid was out of control. Not just fussy.. Like possessed by the devil. Never seen or heard anything like it before... And singer says kid quieted down after a few minutes... Not true! Lasted at least 45 minutes and in the end we returned to the gate. She has A LOT of guts to make it sound like it was nothing."