Amsafe CARES restraint system for aircraft

[Nightfall1983]

Considering getting one of these and buying a separate seat for DS next time we travel (he's not far off two so will need a seat soon anyway). Anyone got one? Anyone heard anything good or bad? Where's best to buy it from? TIA

Hi Nightfall - Just seen your post. We are in the same position, did you buy it in the end and would you recommend it?

We has one. Didn't use it. Waste of money. If the child is under 2 with their own seat they still need to sit on your knee for take off and landing.

We hired one off ebay for a recent flight to malta on a ryanair flight with my 22 month old. Initially the air hostess said he would still need to sit on my knee for take off and landing - I argued that this is not what it states on the website - she went away, checked the rules and came back and told us we were right and could use the harness for takeoff, landing and in flight. It worked really well for us - my son was happy in his own seat and we were all more comfortable.
We were issued 2 boarding passes - one for him to be on my knee and another for his own seat - the issue with the air hostess came because we showed both. On the way home we only showed the one that had him sat in his own seat so they never questioned his age etc and we didn't have to go through the same hassle of arguing the rules!

Sorry I've just seen this, here is my update:

I ended up buying one "nearly-new" from a friend of a friend. I was pleased to find it because they are rather pricey, I felt/feel confident buying one second-hand because unlike a car seat they are pretty tough and couldn't be damaged by dropping etc. they are a tough seat-belt from the same material as an aeroplane seat belt and metal buckles so easy to see that it is in good condition.

We've used it four times so far (two return flights) all short haul so far though we fly long haul in January and we love it. DS was 21 months ish on the first flight and he's a small baby, I feel we only just got away with it as it only just adjusted small enough for him - it's rated for 10 - 20kg and now at 2.1 years he's only just 11kg. It's super easy to fit but it would almost always be in the way of the tray table of the seat behind, which would mean fitting it and then taking it off again after takeoff and then again for landing. Not a problem but does mean that it won't be able to keep them in their seat during the flight. For all our flights thus far I have booked us into the rear row of the plane so we've been able to fit it and leave it. DS objects to it occasionally but is easily distracted by illicit chocolate buttons or my iPad. One of the airlines we've flown with wanted to be informed in advance of the system and they booked us into the rear-row seats (free - yay). The other wasn't interested and I paid to book the appropriate row for ease. When we fly long haul I'm thinking I might not book the back row because you can't recline those seats properly, so I will just have to put up with fitting and refitting maybe. I will see.

Erm, that's all really. Hope that helps - I'm very pleased over all and if we had another child that it would fit I would definitely buy a second one. I rave about it to my friends.

Re being allowed to use it for under twos: it is allowed for the whole flight inc take off and landing for children aged 1 - 4 years and 10 - 20 kg. Allowed as in the civil aviation authority allow it. Individual airlines do have their own policies but all the ones I have checked so far allow it within this. However I did have to justify its use twice - the airline staff didn't recognise it as they had never seen one but it was infact allowed.

Searched for Cares Harness and found this thread. I'm in need of some advice. I'll be going on an 8 hour flight next month with my then 17 month old DD. I have booked a seat for her. It'll just be the two of us and the thought of carrying a car seat along with stroller, minimal hand luggage baby etc through an airport (plus coping with it during nappy changes etc while waiting for the plane) terrifies me. I can't see how I'd manage that. So looking at using the harness.

Has anyone else used the Cares harness? DD is relatively petite but just within the lower weight limit.

I note the previous poster had trouble with the straps and the table behind - I thought it was designed to be put on with the table down so the table can be used as normal (able to open and close). Is that wrong?

Thanks!

I have a CARES harness and like it, but for young/small children (under 18 months I would buy a car seat that would be allowed on the plane. The CARES harness is good but very small children can slip out of it, and it is not brilliant for naps etc. I would say 2-4 is the best age to use it.

We bought one. It was a waste of time.

For everyone who is planning to fly with a young child, you might find of interest the Study on Child Restraint Systems report by the German TUV Rheinland institute. Ive just found it on Google while looking for some info about traveling with kids on the plane. It is a detailed but reader-friendly report covering all currently available child restraint devices.
The main conclusions of this report are that the only reasonably safe way of securing children on a plane is to use an appropriate child car seat or an equivalent child seat designed for air travel provided by an airline. Rear-facing child seats are deemed to be more secure than forward facing ones as they provide a better protection of the head, spine, chest and abdominal area of the child.
The report considers that keeping children on an adults lap, infant loop belts, adult lap belts and CARES/AMSafe harness are all inadequate and dangerous for children younger than 7 years or lower than 125 cm.

The most dangerous is the infant loop belt (please see the report for a full description of what happens in an accident situation to a child restrained in this way). The only thing that it actually does is to prevent an infant from flying across the cabin and from becoming a safety hazard to the other passengers which is probably why some airlines are so happy to provide it. Not only does it not provide any security for the infant, but to the contrary it even increases a risk of a serious and most likely of a fatal injury.

As regards CARES harness, it is considered to be more dangerous than a normal adults lap belt because the shoulder straps of the harness tend to move the adults lap belt even higher into the abdominal area of the child than it would normally be if only the regular lap belt was used. From my personal experience of using CARES for my 2.5 years old I can say that no matter what we did the plastic chest clip always travelled towards her neck which is probably another serious safety hazard in addition to this described by TUV so I will never use it again.
This report has been published in 2007 or 2008 but it doesn't seem that anything has been done about it as of yet by the airlines and airway safety regulators.

When you used the armsafe cares restrain on the raynair flight did you have to phone the airline to use it.