Can someone explain 5am airport drinking?

[Prenoden]

I'm not asking this as a kill joy or teetotaler, I enjoy a drink on holiday as much as anyone but how are people able to stomach pints at 5am?

Been on holiday recently and could barely eat before flight yet everyone else had pints/ g&t etc. It wasn't even mid morning it was 5am

Problem is it appears that the incidence of problems varies from airline to airline and to some extent may be route dependent...

In the grand scheme of things most airports and flights certainly don't end up looking like something like Hogarth might have painted, most certainly not at 5 AM, even if alcohol is available.

I worked as crew for many years and as far as non responsiveness goes the only time I witnessed anyone utterly unable to be roused or moved was at the end of a long haul flight and it was established eventually (paramedic involvment) that was down to medication...

From direct, albeit now dated experience IMO medication, or a mix of medication and some drink possibly caused as many offloads or problems on board than simply drink...

Frankly and again IMO it's easier for cabin crew to spot when drink is becoming an issue and control input...it's tougher when pills etc are sometimes literally in the mix.

I did this on a hen do to show my support. My heart sank when I saw the bottle of prosecco coming out at about 4am, it wasn't a fun experience, although I didn't really know anyone other than the bride so it did take a lot of the effort out of socialising.

So how many flights take off per day in the UK, Europe and World wide??
How many incidents do you read about?

You're being dramatic and you know you are.

They could and so could airports
But they make a shit load of money, so they're not going to.

Selling alcohol is certainly an income stream, especially for the airports, and one of the things it does is enable ticket prices to be kept down.

If you banned sale in terminals airports would increase the often already considerable passenger handling fees that the airlines pay to operate.

I've heard that airports make more money from shops, bars and parking than anything to do with aviation which, in effect, they only facilitate to get people to go there and spend money in the shops and bars and on parking.

Don't know how true that is though. But as someone who generally pays very little for flights (sometimes barely covering the APD tax) never buys anything on a plane and rarely buys more than a Boots meal deal and the odd bottle of gin in the airport, I'd be interested in how much profit I generate.

Don't worry
I make up for you
Always buy in duty free, always get snacks for the plane etc 😋

It'll depend on the airport.

Airports that the airlines really want to use for reasons such as connectivity and geopgraphy can charge the airlines directly a small fortune for things like passenger handling (multiple tens of £s per pax), ramp/parking charges and take-off/landing fees (multiple hundreds £ per hour for parking, possibly multiple thousands per take-off or landing)...for those airports bar takings etc will just be a nice add on to an already hefty revenue stream.

Some smaller airports won't have as much leverage with the airlines and so for them passenger spend in the terminals and for items like parking will be more significant.

It’s not just alcohol causing problems if the massive queue for cubicles in the men’s toilets are anything to go by.