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FAA rules for disruptive passengers. No more silly buggers hopefully.


NoSG0

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Wonder how long before other countries do the same?  Or have in place already?

 

https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-election-aviation/exclusive-faa-chief-vows-zero-tolerance-approach-to-disruptive-passengers-warns-of-possible-jail-time-idUSL1N2JO34I

 

Forgot to mention that the program looks to last into March. Um, because people don't ever behave in a silly manner the rest of the year?

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30 minutes ago, T-21 said:

Ban all alcohol  in terminals before boarding. Its illegal to be drunk on an aircraft as they are a liability in an emergency.

 

I can't begin to express how strongly I agree with this.

 

I used to live a few miles away from an airport and there were several times I saw people incredibly drunk, walking down an unlit dual carriageway at night, with their suitcases on their way back from holiday.

 

I cycled home one day and noticed a bloke lying at the side of the road looking not very well. When I stopped to see if he was OK it turned out he was choking on his own vomit, which I promptly removed and turned him over to get him breathing. He had a mostly drunk bottle of champagne by his suitcase.

 

At least once a month the local news would report of an incredibly drunk passenger delaying an aircraft. Several aircraft had to turn around after taxiing, a couple had to return and land after departing and a couple more landed because they awere enroute to another destination but had a severely disruptive passenger.

 

Go to any town on a Friday evening after pay day, there are lots of incredibly merry people, so merry that some of them get into fights. Introducing people in that state to an aircraft is a bad idea.

 

I love a pint. But I also realise that drinking several pints and going flying (in a commercial aircraft with a cabin pressure of about 10000ft) is not going to end well.

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7 minutes ago, Beermonster1958 said:

Absolutely not. People who are drunk are a liability anywhere, be it staggering along a road, behind the wheel if a vehicle or, getting on an aeroplane.

Either you ban alcohol everywhere or, you ban it nowhere. You're proposing to punish everybody because of a few idiots.

Incidences of drunken passengers are tiny in number compared to the number of drunks rolling around our city centres at weekends (when they pubs are open that is!).

Maybe we should have an absolute ban on pubs full stop?

 

John

 


No just a ban around aircraft, ie airport terminals. Just as most people now accept drink driving is wrong, over time they’ll realise being drunk on a plane is a bad idea. They’d be an utter liability in an emergency and put lives at risk if cabin crew were trying to give them instructions.

 

Why does anyone even need to get drunk before flying? Wait til they get to the hotel. I’m glad we always fly business class if the rest of these planes is like an airborne Wetherspoons! 

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Some airlines are asking for no alcohol to be sold in terminals before 10.00 am  and/or a limit to two drinks  per passenger regulated by scanning their boarding passes.  It is the stag/hen parties getting tanked up in airport terminals and then constantly drinking on board causing many of the issues. Airport bars are exempt from the Licensing Act which needs changing. My father an airline captain nearly had to divert an airliner due to football fans inbound to Glasgow ! being drunk and  very abusive to the female cabin staff. They were met by the police on arrival.

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Not selling alcohol on flights will not help in my opinion, most of the people who are drunk and disruptive are the usual pain in the butt in real life!
At our company people aren’t allowed to drink their own bought alcohol and therefore we are more able to control wat they use as a lot of passengers do listen and buy ours so we are able to regulate it..

I had a passenger once that wasn’t allow to drink by us as a crew ( I am a atendant) and he wouldn’t take no for an answer the whole flight...he was allready under influence when we saw him at the airport were they didn’t sold alcolhol...
He wanted to dispute the thing during flight and told me personally that I could loose my job over this because I wasn’t aware who he was ( o boy was he in for a treat)

If we wanted it we could throw him off ( my captain was in for it and would have done if said the word) at the first nearest destination after such a thing ...we were merciful my purser talked to him and let him continue the flight as he seemed to calm down( he was so close of being thrown off this 6 hour flight)

At the end during disembarking he waited until the two last passengers walked off and kept those between him and when walked off as well he started to shout at me again and said that he would make my life miserable the next flight ....
Sadly because of some miscommunication my colleague ‘s could not stop him on time from stopping him getting off otherwise we would had given him a notice of travel restriction. This means you are only allowed to fly when you have spoken to a security officer about the rules and restrictions you are about to obey to that flight you are about to board.

First of all he doesn’t no who the crew is ....we have special powers....we are for safety on board, that is our first and most important job, therefore you mostly pull the shortest string in court as being a passenger when you behave badly and we as a crew are not able to comply with our safety tasks..

In this case I wrote a extra few lines in our flight report about his aggressive behavior at the end I was called by my company and they told me they had the case onder review and they were gonna take actions and that could be 2 things 1:a travel restriction or 2: a total deny to fly with us..

In the end te company decided to take him under restrictions the return flight ( no alcohol and disruptive behavior and not complying again result in a ban and/or a premature disembarkation somewhere) back to his home destination and this is mostly because we were one of the two airlines that flew to this destination ..

This was the first time I had ever written such a report about someone ...surely more things have occurred like people spitting at each other or annoying eachother by tapping their seats and getting therefore an argument....people still do smoke in toilets, still one off the most occurrences of disruptive behavior...

The number one aggravations now are caused by complying to wearing the facemasks....

But first of all it is important for a cabin crew to recognize were problems are likely to arise and deal with them in such a way that no one notice it!

 

This was just a small insight and not representative for other airlines or even other situations...

 

cheers, Jan

 

Edited by Mike
Obfuscated Swear Removed
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On 14/01/2021 at 17:13, NoSG0 said:

Wonder how long before other countries do the same?  Or have in place already?

 


I am aware of at least two reported cases in the UK of disruptive passengers getting a prison sentence for their conduct on a flight. 3 months for one lady.
 

People get disruptive for a number of reasons but excessive alcohol is most often the principal factor in their behaviour. It’s a central nervous system depressant and when taken the result is first to lower higher brain functions so typically there is the merry stage when you feel happy and great. That’s why it is a popular and historically accepted drug. As one takes more however the effects change as normal inhibitions are stripped away. You can get aggressive or sleepy or other well known effects. Motor functions start to degrade. That’s the progressive effect of a CNS depressant at work. In fact if you can take enough alcohol the effect is to eventually stop even basic brain functions and you die but that’s rare as you mostly end up floored well before that final stage!
 

Alcohol and safety and also good behaviour are not happy bedfellows. The three do not mix. There are scenarios where we are entitled to remove alcohol from that equation.   As an example you don’t want anyone swimming after drinking. It’s a really bad idea for a raft of medical reasons. 
 

As a paying passenger I don’t want a loud disruptive person on a flight and have to put up with it for several hours. I don’t want to see kids on the flight scared by them either. Some people find flying frightening enough without that distraction. I don’t but I can see lots of folk do and at a hint of any problem in the cabin many folk get upset 

 

 Then if the flight diverts or is delayed my ongoing travel as a fellow passenger might mean I miss a connection or find myself getting at my destination hours or days later. I could miss an important business meeting or lose the start of my holiday. If a flight diverts it adds what? At least half a day to the journey time? To me and 180 other folk? And why should airline staff be subject to abuse and even violence?

 

In my view the disruption, costs and the effects of the criminal disruptive conduct (for that’s what it is) justifies a custodial sentence unless there are mitigating circumstances eg medical conditions. What might be conduct justifying a warning from the police in a street or pub setting requires a more substantial response in another setting such as an airliner cabin at 20,000 feet with all that flows from that. 

 

I can’t see a problem with limiting the availability of alcohol at airports or on flights and refusing travel to passengers who are under the influence. I’ve been away on boys weekends where the drinks bill was astronomical- and I kid you not there. No one was less than sober at the airport or on the flight though. 
 

 

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On a lighter note imagine the flight from Hell for certain of the passengers though in the end it didn’t turn out that way. And this is a true story as I was on this trip

 

Scotland we’re playing a friendly football match in Poland. I had a mate who was in the Tartan Army and he persuaded me to come on the adventure. 
 

Flight Glasgow to Gdańsk. Can’t remember the carrier now. Tartan Army in back half of the plane. 4 days staying in Gdańsk and coach trip to another city for the game and back again. 
 

We had a stop over for an hour or two in Luton ? Can’t recall now


We were allocated seats at the back half of the plane going out to Gdańsk . Then as we boarded we noticed another group getting on. Oh dear. The England under 18 squad. 
 

Much banter ensued but all really good natured it has to be said. Some of the young English lads knicked a football off one of the Scottish lads. He was taking it to have the odd kick about. He got it back at Gdańsk covered in signatures. That ball was tucked in his bag not to be seen again. No way was he letting anyone kick that about. I wonder what it’s worth now 

 

Anyway we all parted on good terms and we arrived at our hotel. Imagine the faces when a coach pulls up outside 10 minutes after us and our new found friends see they are staying in the same hotel as us. More banter ensued. 
 

In fact everyone got on really well. The Scots boys ended up supporting the English lads at their game too as we were all best mates by that stage.  Not sure how they took to the advice they got as to how to play their own game or if they understood heavy Glesgae accents. 
 

Did I ever go again?  Nope, couldn’t afford the drinks bill on those outings :D

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2 hours ago, janneman36 said:

Not selling alcohol on flights will not help in my opinion, most of the people who are drunk and disruptive are the usual pain in the a...s in real life!
At our company people aren’t allowed to drink their own bought alcohol and therefore we are more able to control wat they use as a lot of passengers do listen and buy ours so we are able to regulate it..

I had a passenger once that wasn’t allow to drink by us as a crew ( I am a atendant) and he wouldn’t take no for an answer the whole flight...he was allready under influence when we saw him at the airport were they didn’t sold alcolhol...
He wanted to dispute the thing during flight and told me personally that I could loose my job over this because I wasn’t aware who he was ( o boy was he in for a treat)

If we wanted it we could throw him off ( my captain was in for it and would have done if said the word) at the first nearest destination after such a thing ...we were merciful my purser talked to him and let him continue the flight as he seemed to calm down( he was so close of being thrown off this 6 hour flight)

At the end during disembarking he waited until the two last passengers walked off and kept those between him and when walked off as well he started to shout at me again and said that he would make my life miserable the next flight ....
Sadly because of some miscommunication my colleague ‘s could not stop him on time from stopping him getting off otherwise we would had given him a notice of travel restriction. This means you are only allowed to fly when you have spoken to a security officer about the rules and restrictions you are about to obey to that flight you are about to board.

First of all he doesn’t no who the crew is ....we have special powers....we are for safety on board, that is our first and most important job, therefore you mostly pull the shortest string in court as being a passenger when you behave badly and we as a crew are not able to comply with our safety tasks..

In this case I wrote a extra few lines in our flight report about his aggressive behavior at the end I was called by my company and they told me they had the case onder review and they were gonna take actions and that could be 2 things 1:a travel restriction or 2: a total deny to fly with us..

In the end te company decided to take him under restrictions the return flight ( no alcohol and disruptive behavior and not complying again result in a ban and/or a premature disembarkation somewhere) back to his home destination and this is mostly because we were one of the two airlines that flew to this destination ..

This was the first time I had ever written such a report about someone ...surely more things have occurred like people spitting at each other or annoying eachother by tapping their seats and getting therefore an argument....people still do smoke in toilets, still one off the most occurrences of disruptive behavior...

The number one aggravations now are caused by complying to wearing the facemasks....

But first of all it is important for a cabin crew to recognize were problems are likely to arise and deal with them in such a way that no one notice it!

 

This was just a small insight and not representative for other airlines or even other situations...

 

cheers, Jan

 

Being in the same line of work as Jan and having been in several situations (directly or indirectly) involving passengers who've consumed too much I have to venture my opinion here which is MY opinion only based on experience. It sounds draconian but I would remove all alcohol from sale in airports and being served onboard aircraft. 

 

First of all, no one needs alcohol to fly , granted there are some long flights these days but if a person can't last twelve hours or so without an alcoholic beverage then that individual needs to seek help. They can survive the flight on water/ juice/soft drink .  Hydration not inebriation is the answer.

 

In almost all of the situations involving a disruptive passenger alcohol has been a factor, either the root cause or exacerbating the situation.  It's a lot easier to talk someone down when they're sober and as my father used to tell me "You never get anywhere arguing with a drunk or a fool". 

 

If the situation escalates to the point where a passenger has to be restrained (FYI there's usually a couple of steps before that happens unless there's an immediate threat) then this is not only disruptive/frightening to the other passengers but it comes at a cost to the crew members who have to do it. I have so far never had to do it but I've been involved in two instances where it was almost required if the passenger in question hadn't heeded their final warning. I do know several of my colleagues who have had to restrain someone  and it's taken it's toll. 

 

Of course there's the alternative of diverting the aircraft and handing the person or persons to the authorities. This is sometimes easier said than done especially when you're over the north coast of Russia or Canada and hours from a suitable airport. This comes at a huge cost, there's the cost of refuelling the aircraft (not cheap) , the delay which might mean a large number of passengers miss connecting flights and have to be accommodated overnight (cost) or put on another airline or possibly two (bigger cost) . The crew and aircraft are affected operationally by which I mean that due to duty hours limitation they might not be able to continue the flight (more cost) and the aircraft being late for it's next flight which might mean more delays for even more people and (more cost) . 

 

I'm not saying that the removal of alcohol will magically stop all of this from happening because people can still be idiots without alcohol but what I am saying is that it will hopefully reduce the number of incidents and make it easier to deal with them. When smoking was banned on flights (the late '90s for my company)I recall people saying they wouldn't be able to fly /survive without a cigarette and other dire predictions but you know what? They did. That's not to say that you don't still get the occasional idiot who thinks they can sneak a quick puff and the crew won't notice or catch them (we do) . 

 

As I stated originally this is MY opinion and not anyone else's and certainly not my employer's.

 

 

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6 hours ago, T-21 said:

Some airlines are asking for no alcohol to be sold in terminals before 10.00 am  and/or a limit to two drinks  per passenger regulated by scanning their boarding passes.  It is the stag/hen parties getting tanked up in airport terminals and then constantly drinking on board causing many of the issues. Airport bars are exempt from the Licensing Act which needs changing. My father an airline captain nearly had to divert an airliner due to football fans inbound to Glasgow ! being drunk and  very abusive to the female cabin staff. They were met by the police on arrival.

Your mention of airlines requesting for no booze to be sold in terminals before 10am reminds me of the 1990's when I used to regularly fly from Heathrow to Edinburgh on a 7am flight . I was always astounded to see blokes drinking pints of lager in the departure lounge at 6am! I think my astonishment was it was possible to get booze at that time of the day and that anybody bar the most hardened alcoholic would want booze at that time of the day. My presumption was that they were on the Aberdeen flight before going out to the oil rigs. 

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6 hours ago, janneman36 said:

Not selling alcohol on flights will not help in my opinion, most of the people who are drunk and disruptive are the usual pain in the butt in real life!

Quoted for truth.  Please don't use obfuscated swears though, when there are so many fruity but acceptable alternatives :)

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4 hours ago, Stephen said:

It sounds draconian but I would remove all alcohol from sale in airports and being served onboard aircraft. 

Well said! :clap:

 

I was involved as a witness to a drunk passenger incident which involved verbal abuse, violence and a sexual assault against one of my crew. At the court case, the judge took a dim view of the prosecution's case for a custodial sentence as there was ample opportunity for the person to have drunk alcohol in the airport terminal and on board the aircraft. He suggested that if airlines/airports stopped serving alcohol to passengers, the incident in question might not have happened :hmmm:

 

Unsurprisingly, the number of people receiving prison sentences for violent incidents and assaults on flight crew is very tiny for this very reason. Ban the booze, make flying nicer for everyone. But the revenue airlines/airports earn from sales of alcohol is too big to pass over, so as usual the risk/benefit analysis means we get occasional drunks and violence because money.

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9 hours ago, Lord Riot said:


No just a ban around aircraft, ie airport terminals. Just as most people now accept drink driving is wrong, over time they’ll realise being drunk on a plane is a bad idea. They’d be an utter liability in an emergency and put lives at risk if cabin crew were trying to give them instructions.

 

Why does anyone even need to get drunk before flying? Wait til they get to the hotel. I’m glad we always fly business class if the rest of these planes is like an airborne Wetherspoons! 

Yes because us scum in cattle class are just like that.....maybe you want to be a bit less judgemental about those of us who dont normally travel anything but cattle class....only busuness class for work

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13 minutes ago, junglierating said:

Yes because us scum in cattle class are just like that.....maybe you want to be a bit less judgemental about those of us who dont normally travel anything but cattle class....only busuness class for work


Obviously not everyone in economy, just the one or two minority idiots spoiling it for everyone else. What I had in mind was these stag/hen flights to the Med, they must be awful.

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1 hour ago, junglierating said:

Yes because us scum in cattle class are just like that.....maybe you want to be a bit less judgemental about those of us who dont normally travel anything but cattle class....only busuness class for work

I work for a so called Low budget airline with just one class and most of our country’s celebrities buy our tickets and we have loads of nice people as well And that is the main reason I still like my job 😉 we don’t have a lot of nasty people....though smoking in the lavatories is one of the highest scores amongst things not to do ...for 2020 I had zero drunk disruptive passengers...🙏 I had one disruptive one who tried to smoke in the lavatories who was already on coke for three days....🤪...

 

1 hour ago, Lord Riot said:


Obviously not everyone in economy, just the one or two minority idiots spoiling it for everyone else. What I had in mind was these stag/hen flights to the Med, they must be awful.

It is always a minority’s that spoils it...but sitting in that aluminium tube every situation is potentially contagious and in the picture..

 

cheers and fly safe and happy, Jan

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1 hour ago, Alan P said:

But the revenue airlines/airports earn from sales of alcohol is too big to pass over, so as usual the risk/benefit analysis means we get occasional drunks and violence because money.

 

And therein lay the truth of the matter. No amount of debate on any forum will change this, only, god forbid, a catastrophe in flight would change this and that is the saddest truth of all.

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12 hours ago, janneman36 said:

I work for a so called Low budget airline with just one class and most of our country’s celebrities buy our tickets and we have loads of nice people as well And that is the main reason I still like my job 😉 we don’t have a lot of nasty people....though smoking in the lavatories is one of the highest scores amongst things not to do ...for 2020 I had zero drunk disruptive passengers...🙏 I had one disruptive one who tried to smoke in the lavatories who was already on coke for three days....🤪..

Or the M and M's hiding in the WC during the flight. " Only 13 hours to go ... "

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14 hours ago, Alan P said:

Well said! :clap:

 

I was involved as a witness to a drunk passenger incident which involved verbal abuse, violence and a sexual assault against one of my crew. At the court case, the judge took a dim view of the prosecution's case for a custodial sentence as there was ample opportunity for the person to have drunk alcohol in the airport terminal and on board the aircraft. He suggested that if airlines/airports stopped serving alcohol to passengers, the incident in question might not have happened :hmmm:

 

Unsurprisingly, the number of people receiving prison sentences for violent incidents and assaults on flight crew is very tiny for this very reason. Ban the booze, make flying nicer for everyone. But the revenue airlines/airports earn from sales of alcohol is too big to pass over, so as usual the risk/benefit analysis means we get occasional drunks and violence because money.

Personally I think it should be the other way round. If you want a beer/G&T before a flight or on the flight, fine. But make a right pigs ear of it before/during or after and it should look very much like a trip to pokey without passing go and if there are divert costs, you should be reaching into your savings to offset a good chunk of them. The number of instances where all sorts of weird, wonderful and pretty poor excuses have been proffered to "justify" the reason for being newt like and aggressive/violent and accepted by the courts are also part of the problem (not just on flights either, my other half is a paramedic and witnesses far too often poor behaviour that keeps on getting repeated by frequent customers with no effective sanctions).  Removing the ability to have a drink because of the actions of a few is not really the answer. But certainly the likes of Wetherspoons etc in the airports should be exercising judgement before pouring the 10th pint of lager for the wobbly bloke at 8 in the morning, if only to stop him disturbing his seat mates keeping his bladder empty!

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1 hour ago, Greg B said:

 Wetherspoons etc in the airports should be exercising judgement before pouring the 10th pint of lager for the wobbly bloke at 8 in the morning, if only to stop him disturbing his seat mates keeping his bladder empty!

I don't know. Leaving it to personal responsibility clearly can't work, and trying to get a chain pub to stop serving is equally unlikely.

 

I just think there are some places where drunks just shouldn't be, and on an aeroplane is one of them.

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Given I can't buy a magazine after the gate without a boarding card, it does seem odd that alcohol purchases are possible without one (I am aware that the reason is simply so the shop avoids having to pay VAT on export purchases, but it shows the systems are in place). Yes, people could drink before security, but maybe anyone obviously inebriated at that point could be breathalysed and refused access.

There's a huge difference between someone having a beer with lunch in the airport and a glass of wine on the plane and the troublemakers who drink more than they can handle at 7am. It should be possible to find a solution which stops the dangerous behavoiur of a few and allows the majority a pleasant and relaxing start to their holiday. A drink isn't essential, but it's part of the switching off of the daily work ritual and the start of the holiday.

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My last flight to the UK was with Royal Brunei who don't serve any alcohol on their aircraft for cultural reasons ; possibly there are other such carriers I'm  not aware of.

 

No doubt I or anyone else could have boarded the flight three sheets to the wind but I saw no sign of it and the flight was as comfortable and uneventful as sitting in a tin tube for 27-odd hours can be.......

Other flights in the past have not been so peaceful, for all the reasons stated above.........

Rog

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11 hours ago, Alan P said:

I don't know. Leaving it to personal responsibility clearly can't work,


I tend to agree - in many instances, I find that it’s typically a breach of the ‘trust’ in people to do the reasonable/right thing.
It’s always that small group that breaks the trust and spoils it for the rest.

 

Cynical me says that it’s considered okay, as long as the £€¥$ keep flowing...

the-spice-must-flow.jpg

 

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As a frequent traveller (or better, a former frequent traveller...) I can see both sides of the the coin here. Clearly the sale of alcohol in airport bars is a potential source of problems and I've witnessed plenty of times people already pretty high by 11 AM. They may have been boys heading to a stag party, folks going on holiday for whom afterall the trip is already part of the holiday or sport supporters travelling for their team, I've seen them all. Were they a danger ? Probably 99% of them were not but things can escalate pretty quickly when people are in such state and it is scary to see how even normally very decent people can change after a pint too much. So from this point of view I can perfectly understand how many professionals feel and why they would like to see alcohol banned from airports.

At the same time travelling mostly for work I know how good it feels to enjoy a pint or a glass of wine while waiting for my flight at the end of a business trip, it's a way to relax and celebrate another job completed.  I also have a good list in my memory of things discussed with others over a pint, be it discussing future projects with colleagues and customers or just having a chat with some random person met on a long flight before each will take the next flight home. For these reason I would sure miss the chance of having a drink at the airport.

Still safety is paramount and in the same way as I never have any drink on my outbound flight to a job, I would understand if the relevant authorities would ban the sale of alcohol in airports. The number of such accidents may be small but even this can be of great danger in the confined spaces of an aircraft. Of course I fully realise that this is something I can't see happening anytime soon.

Now of course the problem of drunken behaviour is not limited to air travel and no, closing all pubs is not really the answer... the answer would be to try and change the culture as the consumption of large quantity of alcohol is a cultural thing in several parts of the world. What maybe should be done is try and pass the ideas that having a couple of pints can be a great thing but having as many pints as one can throw in his stomach before collapsing is not. enjoying a few glasses of wine can be wonderful but guzzling bottle after bottle of cheap plonk just to get drunk is not good. Not that I believe this will ever happen, a certain approach to alcohol is too deeply rooted in certain cultures to hope for things to change.

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