Best CF airplane stories

[BreadInCaptivity]

Inspired by another thread.

About 5 years ago we were flying back from the USA. We'd booked Premium Economy seats on Virgin. Configuration is 2-3-2.

Our two late teens were in front of us and we had the 2 seats directly behind. All settled in when a family of 4 embarked with 2 young children (around 5 and 7 at a guess).

They proceed to the 2 seats behind DH and I and start putting their bags down when the mother asked (politely to be fair) if we would mid swapping seats so they could sit together as a family.

Given our two were older (and once headphones were on were not going to be engaging with us) we decided to be nice and said ok.

Can you guess where this is going?

Asked where the other seats were, looking around the PE cabin a bit baffled as it appeared to be full....

Yep - they'd only booked 2 seats in PE and wanted us to take their 2 seats in economy 😂.

Clearly we said, no (with rather incredulous expressions on our face's) and sat back down. Parent then both start calling us selfish (oh the irony) and demanding we move. DH made the point that if sitting together was so important, then booking in the same cabin might be a good idea for the future, but as stands he was sure if they went down to economy the people in the seats next to those they'd booked would be very happy with a free upgrade 😀.

The response from the Father "I'm not giving up a better seat I've paid for"....to which DH deadpanned "I couldn't agree with you more"...at which point DH and I couldn't stop laughing enough to respond further.

Cabin crew eventually had to get involved as the parents had an argument over who was going to sit where. Mother won and spent the first 20 mins of the flight making loud passive aggressive comments to her child about "mean/selfish" people until crew got involved again and told her to pack it in or they'd be moved to economy if they didn't stop harassing us.

Thankfully the rest of the flight was uneventful but DH and I still chuckle about it now and again 😃.

Anyone got any others?

It’s like that on every narrowbody, 3-3 configuration plane in Europe, yes. The middle seat gets blocked out and that’s what you pay the premium for.

Been on a flight where we didn't pay on the way back not sure why so sat where we were given. The lady who I was sat next to said to me your in my husband's I said oh sorry its on my boarding pass, I said down and she said oh, I will speak to the crew. She said oh its OK he couldn't make it and proceeded to tell me the story. She was really nice but odd.

Photo of BA Club Europe (Business Class) with middle seat blocked with insert. This is the standard configuration.

What was the story??

This is fantastic

Years ago we totally lucked out. DH’s seat was in front of mine when it became obvious that the family meant to be sitting next to him and me were too large for their seats. They were moved to a different part of the plane and though we expected someone else to come along we ended up with the 2 x 3 seats to ourselves. I heard someone across the aisle call them FOF’s, I must have looked confused because they explained “family of fatties!” I’m no slim Jim myself!

I don't know if it's true, but when I asked why people on a USA national flight made a big fuss about swapping seats, when they could have booked up the seats they want, I was told that on some USA flights they can't book up seat numbers.

Flew long haul and arrived in UK this am at 0630.
Right after the steward took our trays my 10 year old son was looking in the seat pocket in front for his book and the lady in the seat in front put her seat back- fair enough as we all can but he had to move fast. He side eyed her through the gap and as I was bending down to pick up the book her friend in the seat in front of me did the same but faster. I was calm and didn't make a fuss but as I got up may have whispered a bad word.
I have a bump on my head and a bruise from where my table hit me.
Etiquette is to check behind you, ask polightly or inform that you will be reclining.
Not be a pair of ducking knats and think it's funny.
Oh, just to say I have no issues with reclining but being epileptic and having a head bump 2 hours into an almost 9 hour flight is really not ok.

Well, you are the obvious choice shorty :-)

Wait for the food to come round and then smear some in her hair. She won't do it again!

This is how you solve this:

1 Make sure you have a glass of water
2 Sneeze loudly and ostentatiously
3 Splash water from your glass over their foot as you 'sneeze'
4 Repeat as needed

If they don't move their foot after that, they're not only a Cheeky Fucker, they're also a Dozy Fucker.

We flew Swiss Air a couple of years ago and they gave free seat selection at the time of booking for all passengers. It was the cheapest option too. We mostly fly in business on BA and it rankles that they expect us to pay another £800 to book seats for long haul flights (we're not silver or gold members).

And yes, while you don't pay to book the middle seat on BA club world short haul flights, the deal is that the middle seat is unoccupied. Bar the really average meal (last time it was lunch for breakfast at 6am as they'd run out of breakfasts apparently), it's the only real perk of flying business.

I'd prebooked my family of four to sit together in CW on one flight and BA decided to give economy passengers our seats (from a cancelled flight) and put us all in the middle seats scattered round the cabin. I wasn't pissed off with the passengers but I was really pissed off that BA didn't slot in the other passengers in the middle seats given they hadn't paid for business (I'd had a hip replacement and booked the aisle seat so I could stretch my legs).

I’m so glad I don’t fly anymore.

My son broke his leg while we were on holiday and insurance paid for him to have a row of 3 seats on the return flight so that his cast could be kept elevated.

Woman in the middle seat of the row in front suddenly chucked her bag over the seat back into the aisle seat where his foot was and then dumped herself into that seat.

FA dumped her right back.

I have 2.

The first is where I found it bonkers someone refused to switch seats. I was flying from Auckland to London via LA with Air NZ. I was in business and the configuration was 1-2-1 and I was in one of the middle seats. About 2 hours into the flight someone has a medical crisis. It was really scary, expectedly for the poor person having this happen right over the Atlantic. I was in the front row of the second section of business so just in front of the FA’s galley area and they brought the patient to that galley. They had the curtains closed but as they don’t fully touch the floor you could see everything going on. There was - incredibly - a real doctor on board and with her help this person was stabilised.

Because of where the oxygen and medical supplies were the cabin crew asked the person on the end of the configuration to swap to a business seat about 6 rows back so they could put the patient in his seat and keep the oxygen connected. He said no because he “didn’t have the energy” to move all his things. I obviously immediately said yes.

The second story I was on a different LA to London flight and was travelling virgin PE. Seats were 3-4-3 and I was on aisle of the 4. Family of 4 were on other seats (one child was on parent’s lap as under 1) and the mum with baby was sat next to me. They got on with tension. Turns out everything they’d downloaded for their 3/4 year old had failed to download and they were having a fight - albeit a very quiet and civilised fight - about it. Mum put the crawling aged baby on floor (not a parent myself, but I did and still do find this weird) while she and dad talked very tensely across other child about how to fix the iPad situation. Baby was totally forgotten about as he crawled through my legs into the aisle. As people were boarding he was going to be minimally disruptive but possibly get hurt so I had to quickly scoop him up.

I immediately said to mum “I’m so sorry I had to pick him up before he crawled into the aisle as I was worried he would be hurt!” She was very nice and said “oh god thank you!” And just left me holding her baby for the next 40 minutes 🤣 I think she’d have left me holding him for take off had I not insisted she have him back.

In fairness, this was the cutest baby I’ve ever met 🤣 It was a delightful cuddle and as a nervous flyer an excellent distraction!

Also, to this day her bladder impresses me. In a 12 hour flight she went ONCE. And yes, I held the baby when she went.

Sat on a plane once to Rome from LHR, with my then 1 year old. Pre take off on my lap he was wiggling and we were trying to move him to my husband, said child banged the young lady in fronts seat. She was mid twenties with a shiny bling new wedding ring she kept admiring whilst whispering in her husbands ear. She turned round and gave me a mouthful about keeping my child restrained and that she was in "premium" (wouldn't have known except a skanky black curtain).

I think of her every now and then and wonder if she still thinks that way, assuming she's not had kids and knows what it's like to wrestle a small child on a cramped plane and I smirk.

Why were her arse and heels relevant to this story?

The OMG was because this point had been answered about 20 times already before you posted. And no, it's in Europe too. My DH flies to Germany for work and this is what he has.

Yep blocking the B/E seats out (some time physically) to magically produce business class on short haul is fairly standard, even in Europe.

In case anybody is still in the dark as to why it’s done like this it’s because it allows the number of business class vs. economy seats available on an aircraft to be changed rapidly, without major engineering input.

To change the configuration all you need to do is remove/install any physical blocker from the centre seat (e.g. the tray assembly that BA have, as shown in a pp) and move the deliberately designed to be moveable cabin divider fore or aft as appropriate

I was thinking this - and as the commenter mentioned that the lady only went to the toilet once in the end, I also wondered whether the poor lady made herself very uncomfortable so as not to disturb her sleeping neighbour. Holding on as long as possible to relieve herself rather than making more frequent trips. Honestly, this story makes me uncomfortable.

@ValleyOfTheTramadols why does it make you feel uncomfortable? It is accepted on planes if you have paid for an aisle seat you may get regularly disturbed to let other passengers get out.

As cabin crew I’ve seen a lot of cheeky f**Kerry on board… I was working in first, I noticed we had an extra customer in 2K so I checked with the ground staff (as we were still boarding) if they had upgraded anyone at the gate…. They hadn’t, so I asked the passenger for his boarding pass, which he had apparently ‘misplaced’… I was certain that he wasn’t meant to be in first by this point so advised that if he couldn’t find it, we would have to offload him and his luggage due to security. Boarding pass magically appeared and his seat number was actually 48K! Sent the CF down the back to his correct seat, absolutely sure that this was not a genuine ‘mistake’ as he claimed🙄

This is brilliant!

The lady could have gone each time OP got up, but didn’t. She was clearly assertive enough to try and get OP to swap, but you think she sat in her seat, even when OP was out of it, desperate for the loo, for fear of disturbing someone who would have expected to be disturbed (and wasn’t even there)? Your logic is twisted. There is nothing in the posts to suggest the lady in question was put in a bad position or one any worse than OP would have been had she swapped.

Great idea! It’s the psychology of thinking you’ve gained something that’s so important!