Jumbo Jets

| 1 Comment
I subscribe to the UC Berkeley Wellness Letter. They do have their major articles on-line but they will frequently have "filler" items that do not get included in their on-line edition. This one is interesting, from the February 2005 issue: bq. A surprising result of the obesity epidemic. Because of the increasing weight of Americans -- an average gain of about ten pounds per person -- US airplanes consumed an extra 350 Million Gallons of Jet Fuel in 2000, CDC researchers recently estimated. bq. This costs the financially strapped airline industry $270 Million a year. And the extra fuel results in the release of about 3.8 Million tons of carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas) and other pollutants. Side effects...

1 Comment

I thought I had heard that this was the case, and I'm curious if the airlines are ever going to do anything about it.

I'm getting ready to leave on a two-week kiteboarding trip to Baja, and I'm really frustrated by the baggage limitations of America West. Kiteboarding is a rather gear-intensive sport (two kites, kiteboard, kitebar, lines, etc.), and somehow I have to cram all this stuff into luggage that doesn't exceed their recommended dosage of airline travel.

Charging for overweight (and oversize) cargo is part of the game for airline travel. I am allowed two checked bags under 50 pounds and under 62 dimensional inches without being overcharged. After that, their accepted sizes and fees are clearly posted, and it in my best interest to fanagle my belongings and avoid being charged hundreds of dollars extra.

So then, I'm curious when (if ever) airlines will start charging people for being oversized or overweight. As evidenced by this article, obesity is placing a financial burden on the airlines, and it should only be fair that they redistribute the cost to those who are raising the price.

It's not as crazy as it sounds, but the outcry from "politically correcticians" would no doubt be monstrous. They have a box for testing the size of your carry-on for determining whether or not it needs to be checked; how about a structure in the line for check-in that says, "You must fit through this arch in order to board this plane."

Okay, maybe that's not such a great idea. But how about factoring bodyweight into how much baggage one is allowed to check? Under the current system, the 300 pound hamfister is allowed to check just as much baggage as the 120 pound weakling. Even with two 50 pound bags, the gross load weight of the lighter person would still be less than the bodyweight of the heavier one. That's certainly not fair for the passenger, nor economical for the airline.

How about we cut some slack for the scrawny aero traveler?

October 2022

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
            1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30 31          

Environment and Climate
AccuWeather
Cliff Mass Weather Blog
Climate Depot
Ice Age Now
ICECAP
Jennifer Marohasy
Solar Cycle 24
Space Weather
Watts Up With That?


Science and Medicine
Junk Science
Life in the Fast Lane
Luboš Motl
Medgadget
Next Big Future
PhysOrg.com


Geek Stuff
Ars Technica
Boing Boing
Don Lancaster's Guru's Lair
Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories
FAIL Blog
Hack a Day
Kevin Kelly - Cool Tools
Neatorama
Slashdot: News for nerds
The Register
The Daily WTF


Comics
Achewood
The Argyle Sweater
Chip Bok
Broadside Cartoons
Day by Day
Dilbert
Medium Large
Michael Ramirez
Prickly City
Tundra
User Friendly
Vexarr
What The Duck
Wondermark
xkcd


NO WAI! WTF?¿?¿
Awkward Family Photos
Cake Wrecks
Not Always Right
Sober in a Nightclub
You Drive What?


Business and Economics
The Austrian Economists
Carpe Diem
Coyote Blog


Photography and Art
Digital Photography Review
DIYPhotography
James Gurney
Joe McNally's Blog
PetaPixel
photo.net
Shorpy
Strobist
The Online Photographer


Blogrolling
A Western Heart
AMCGLTD.COM
American Digest
The AnarchAngel
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler
Babalu Blog
Belmont Club
Bayou Renaissance Man
Classical Values
Cobb
Cold Fury
David Limbaugh
Defense Technology
Doug Ross @ Journal
Grouchy Old Cripple
Instapundit
iowahawk
Irons in the Fire
James Lileks
Lowering the Bar
Maggie's Farm
Marginal Revolution
Michael J. Totten
Mostly Cajun
Neanderpundit
neo-neocon
Power Line
ProfessorBainbridge.com
Questions and Observations
Rachel Lucas
Roger L. Simon
Samizdata.net
Sense of Events
Sound Politics
The Strata-Sphere
The Smallest Minority
The Volokh Conspiracy
Tim Blair
Velociworld
Weasel Zippers
WILLisms.com
Wizbang


Gone but not Forgotten...
A Coyote at the Dog Show
Bad Eagle
Steven DenBeste
democrats give conservatives indigestion
Allah
BigPictureSmallOffice
Cox and Forkum
The Diplomad
Priorities & Frivolities
Gut Rumbles
Mean Mr. Mustard 2.0
MegaPundit
Masamune
Neptunus Lex
Other Side of Kim
Publicola
Ramblings' Journal
Sgt. Stryker
shining full plate and a good broadsword
A Physicist's Perspective
The Daily Demarche
Wayne's Online Newsletter

About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by DaveH published on February 2, 2005 7:20 PM.

Biodiesel give and take was the previous entry in this blog.

Misguided relief efforts for Tsunami is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.

Monthly Archives

Pages

OpenID accepted here Learn more about OpenID
Powered by Movable Type 5.2.9