4 Things Passengers Don’t Realize They Do That Annoy Flight Attendants
Do you really want to be on a flight attendant's bad side?
Kelly | Pexels | Studio GL | Shutterstock | Canva Pro The surly, disgruntled flight attendant has become something of a cliche, and one most travelers have encountered in real life a time or two. But that bad mood is probably not coming from nowhere, because according to one veteran of the job, we passengers do a handful of things that drive them up the wall.
The job of a flight attendant is hard enough in the first place. People think that they're little more than glorified waiters and waitresses, but that couldn't be further from the truth — they are quite literally tasked with keeping you alive from point A to point B. While air accidents are thankfully rare, it is often flight attendants' crisis skills that make the difference when they do happen.
The point is that things are probably already on thin ice from the very beginning, but then on top of it, we add these bad habits called out by flight attendant and TikToker @cherdallas in a recent video. Here are the four things she says you should really stop doing on your next flight.
Here are 4 things passengers don't realize they do that annoy flight attendants:
1. Sleeping on tray tables.
Yes, you're blocking the aisle and probably annoying the crap out of the person in front of you, but that's not the real problem, according to Cher. It's that you're likely damaging the tray table in ways that cause mishaps a flight attendant will likely ultimately get blamed for.
"When people sleep on the tray tables, a lot of the time it bends the metal that's holding the table," she explained. "Next time I hand a passenger a cup of ice or soda or something, it will slide right down into their lap." Now someone has Coke all over their pants and thinks it's the flight attendant's fault. Knock it off!
2. Forming a line for the bathroom.
Cher admits that there's pretty much no way around this one, but that doesn't make it any less annoying, especially because the flight attendants' seats are often right beside the bathroom.
"It's so annoying when there's like a long line standing there over the top of me while I'm trying to eat my lunch," she said. You're also, of course, in the way.
3. Leaning into the aisle while sleeping.
This is hard not to do, and Cher admits even she is guilty of it when she sits on the aisle too. Still, the aisle is so narrow that anyone leaning into it is impeding the traffic flow, if you will.
But what really grinds Cher's gears is the people who use the aisle as their personal space to sprawl out. "Some people go overboard with it," she said. "They'll have their whole entire feet out in the aisle or [be] leaning their whole body out, and then I feel like I'm injuring them every time I walk by on accident."
4. Going to the bathroom during drink service.
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"[This] will annoy most flight attendants," she said. That whole cart down the aisle thing is already a pretty intricate dance given how cramped and narrow the space is — that aisle is a one-way street once the cart's in it, after all.
"We just spent several minutes setting up the cart, making sure everything's done, pacing ourselves to go at the same time as the other flight attendants — and then you get up and go to the bathroom and I have to be like okay, excuse me, back up, and then I'm off pace with the other flight attendants," Cher explained.
She admits that none of these are the end of the world, but do you really want the person tasked with saving your life distracted by your big dumb feet in the aisle — or worse, forming a vendetta against you that will play itself out when it's time for them to lead you down the escape slide? Tighten up, fellow passengers, plane travel is miserable enough already!
John Sundholm is a writer, editor, and video personality with 20 years of experience in media and entertainment. He covers culture, mental health, and human interest topics.