Hand Luggage on Planes

quote:

Is it really necessary?

Probably not, provided that:

The Airlines increased our hold baggage allowances without raising ticket prices. Many would no doubt argue thy could be lowered given the fact that the checking and flow of customers in to Departures could be more automated, thus needing fewer of those costly staff to police.

The baggage handlers promise not to loose my bag.

They promise not to smash it and bash it about.

Three simple requests, but how likely are they to be achieved?

In the mean time I will carry my valubles like laptop, tonearms and cartridges through in hand luggage and I'll make sure I have them all ready for inspection.

KR

Peter

I'm guessing you're not a photographer then...?!

Regardless of the value of my kit (which would give most 500 based systems here a run for their money!) it would be purely 'unprofessional' if I arrived at my destination armed only with the excuse "sorry, the airline lost/damaged my bags".......One thing is for sure, my film (unexposed or exposed even more so) ain't never going in the hold - I'd rather walk if that was ever forced on me!

That said, I think it's all about being reasonable, being prepared and learning how to pack well as a passenger on a plane - the amount of times I've been in my seat (normally quite early) and watch with a mixture of sheer disbelief and amusement as other passengers board and struggle their way up the aisles....How, and why, do they need all that crap !?

It's always pretty easy to tell seasoned travellers or professionals apart from 'once a year getaways' at airports.....

Steve.

What we really need is a total weight ticket price. That is passenger and baggage combined.
I am fed up of paying per kilo to fly diving equipment when the person bulging out of the next seat has double my body weight travelling on the same ticket price.

Very good point.

Getting pulled up by an officious check-in employee because your hand-luggage (or for that matter your checked bags) is 1/2kg over some designated limit is laughable when there is no consideration given to passenger weight.....

Actually, I've always wondered about that - how do pilots/airlines make an estimated calculation on a plane's total weight ? Sure, the hold baggage can be totalled as it's being checked in but what if every passenger who turned up for said flight was 120Kg ?! - How much of a margin is there on take-off weight ? Any pilots here..?!

Thankfully, once one has a gold-card, the check-in 'rules' seem to relax a bit....

Chaps

When I travel to Spain, I need only take my passport as everything I need is already packed in the shack I got out there.

I use Ryanair a lot because they are comfortable enough for a short flight, they are relaiable and cheap. Their hand luggage quotas are slowly reducing over the years and the travelling case you bought last year may be too big to be taken abroad this year, so you end up paying a large surcharge.

I now use a large Billingham holdall bag which can be bashed about and squeesed to fit in their sizing test frame.

This also makes taking a cruise direct from a UK port a lot more attractive, as you can load your pile of suitcases from the car straight onto the boat. Also you don't have to worry about the US Immigration thugs.

Regards

Mick

quote:

Originally posted by Cymbiosis:
In the mean time I will carry my valubles like laptop, tonearms and cartridges through in hand luggage ....

I normally take my iPod on the plane - I find vinyl tends to skip during take off

All this hand-baggage nonsense started when Ryanair started to squeeze the airports - I would much rather check-in a small bag, keeping small valuables/techno-bits about my person, but now I have to pay 30 quid for the privilege, I'm damned if I'm going to line O'Leary's pockets. The problem with his approach is that the overhead lockers were never designed to take so much hand-baggage, so it's a free-for-all when boarding.
But now of course, they are reducing the weight limit all the while, so forcing us to pay for checked luggage or excess.
In the last 12 months, I have managed to avoid Ryanair completely, simply for that reason, but I expect the other lo-costs will go the same way eventually
Almost sputtered into a rant there - time for a coffee

I got on a flight last month to Brussels 45 mins flight duration.
I was 6 or 7th person on, but the 1st 5 people (a group of non-UK business suits) had already loaded up the 1st 3 row overheads (18 seats) with hand & carry-on baggage, & the carry-on was way over the regulation size needing to go in sideways - you know the story.
When I asked the crew member what happened to 1 bag rule, she said it was OK 'cause the flight is not full.
OK !!! O-frigging-K, I ended up putting my 1x laptop bag in row 4 to sit in row 1 (no underseat bags allowed in row 1)
The happy part of the story was one of the the people asked me if I would move so they could all sit together for an "important" meeting
---- Oh deep joy, I wonder what part of NO they where so upset about ??? ----

Per SC

quote:

Getting pulled up by an officious check-in employee because your hand-luggage (or for that matter your checked bags) is 1/2kg over some designated limit is laughable when there is no consideration given to passenger weight.....

Passenger weight - chances of being tackled when the USA appears to have the upper hand re air travel? Luckily UK passengers are catching up.

Cheers,
OW

when we go away for a sunny short break we both take a mini suitcase that is exactly the dimensions that Ryanair allow, save the checking in fees.

We're not allowed to check our laptops (even though the disks are encrypted) so need hand luggage.
Back in the good old days used to travel with just my laptop backpack and a tri-fold suiter. Could live out of that all week. Now I have to check a bag. Damn nuisance. And what's this crap with taking my bloody belt off? Damn risky on an early morning flight before I've had any breakfast to keep my trousers up.

Willy.

SC

To answer your question re: how pax weights are calculated we use standard weights in my company for male 90Kg and female 78Kg. I believe most other airlines operating airliners are on the same basis. These weights are revised occasionally too but I'm not sure on what basis.

In terms of margin of safety all airliners certified for public transport have to be able to climb out on one engine which is assumed to fail at the worst possible moment on the take-off roll. In addition it's worth bearing in mind that most commercial take-offs are 'flexed' at a reduced power setting according to a variety of parameters such as runway length, altitude, wind, temperature, take-off weight, wet/dry runway etc etc. This reduces both engine wear, noise etc. These calculations are dony by the pilots prior to every flight. Worth bearing in mind that should it become necessary the pilots can advance the power beyond the derated take-off setting at any time should they wish and in addition on my type (Dash 8 Q400) and I believe many others it is possible to push the power levers up further beyond normal 'full power' to demand even higher thrust should special circumstances e.g. windshear require it.

Mind you when we position empty aircraft I always try and use full power just for the fun - goes up like a rocket unladen!

Worth noting too that the performace tables we use are also very pessimistic and certainly the Q400 is very overpowered if anything.

Jonathan

Hey, these engines go to eleven!!

Tony

Fascinating Jonathan - thanks !

I knew, for instance, the 747 could fly on one engine but I didn't realise their was enough power on hand for it to take off on one..!

Still, even though I am aware and understand the physics of flying, I still occasionally find myself gazing out of the window on take-off wondering how the hell these things lift off..! (especially the A380, which I try and make a point of choosing - soooo quiet & smooth)

Steve.

quote:

Originally posted by Tony Lockhart:
Hey, these engines go to eleven!!

quote:

Is it really necessary?

My rule is if you afford to lose it, then put in the hold, otherwise I hand-carry it. Generally, I hand carry very little.

quote:

Originally posted by Martin M:

quote:

Is it really necessary?

My rule is if you afford to lose it, then put in the hold, otherwise I hand-carry it. Generally, I hand carry very little.

Yep same here.

I travel quite a bit on short International trips. I pack light so I can go straight through customs and safe some time.
In addition, nothing is worse than arriving for a business meeting and your checked in luggage has just gone missing for the next 48hrs, you get it just in time for your trip back and met with some business partners or clients in your jeans and t-shirt.

A correction:

For SC's benefit, my apologies: commercial aeroplanes are certified to be able to take-off when an engine fails at the worst possible moment - quite different to a jumbo taking off on one engine. In the jumbo's case it would take-off on 3, in my own two engined aircraft we could take off on one as would a 737 etc. Crucially the aircraft would not merely get airborne but must be capable of meeting all the required obstacle clearance limits for a given departure. Where extreme terrain is involved e.g. Alpine ski resorts an emergency turn procedure woulde be invoked designed to ensure terrain clearance in the event of diminished performance due to engine failure.

My apologies for misleading you and I hope that clarifies.

Jonathan

I'm never flying with you then...!

No worries, and thanks for the clarification....So if I hear one bang on take-off we're ok, but two.... !

Cheers, Steve.

Do as I've done, and stop using aeroplanes to travel.

No huge loss.

happy to stop flying. But it is a very long walk from here in Saigon, Vietnam to get back to Cambridge for Monday lunchtime, when my clients turn up for a meeting.

And I'm not sure if I would be back in time to walk/drive/swim to Los Angeles middle of next month either.

Indeed. We all have lifestyle choices to make.

While I'm the first to admit that much of the luxury of flying has gone in the loco era I do think it's a shame not to experience the incredible experience of flight and the unique perspective on the world it provides.

I love flying from Southampton to Glasgow because we fly straight up the Pennine range, you can see both the East and West coast of the UK from the front, the divine Lake District, Snowdonia, the Wirral peninsula. When I was a kid in my seaside hometown of Southport I used to lay on my back in the garden watching the planes going overhead wondering where they were going to and wishing I was aboard. Now when I fly over I always wonder if there's an eight year old boy looking up and watching us in the blue.

Further North again we fly on up over the border countries in all their barren magnificence and over the strange radio telescope there I have never been able to find the purpose or identity of. Finally Loch Lomond slips into view, Edinburgh is off to our right, the Sun setting in a million colours over the Isle of Arran on our left. Great views now as we come down through 7000 feet at Lanark before turning onto finals for Glasgow Rwy 23.

It always strikes me that these views have only been available to us for the past 100 years or so. Before that nobody had ever seen the Lake District from the air and my what a privilege it is.

Maybe we get better views because in the turboprop we are 10 000 feet lower than the jets, I just know that there's hardly a single day when I am not blown away by what's outside the window. Even when flying as a passenger I always choose a window seat even now...

I know a couple of us have been kicking around the idea of chartering a Dash 8, re-fitting it Pullman style and offering flights the old fashioned way. Silver service, cocktails, fine steak, china plates and multi-leg journeys the way Imperial Airways used to do it nightstopping Venice, Cairo, Jeddah, Muscat, Karachi, Nepal, Delhi. Dinners in fine hotels hosted by the crew, detours with low passes over the Pyramids or the Taj for sightseeing - wonderful if we could ever pull it off!!

Jonathan

Cambridge to Glasgow would do!

Maybe when the economy picks up and people start blowing their credit/debt again it'll be a goer!

Tony

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
Indeed. We all have lifestyle choices to make.

Precisely. Why do our friends live a long way from us? Because they can, and still be our friends. If we couldn't fly or drive, our friends (who would be different, but equally nice people) would live close by.

Why to we have global trade and global corporations? Because we can. If we couldn't fly all over, businesses would have to be more local. There would likely be inefficiencies compared to the current state of things and we might have fewer material posessions; but would we be worse off? I don't know.

We trade improved speed for distance, not for time. Whether we are walking, cycling, driving or flying, we measure the personal (not finacial) cost in minutes and hours. We don't think a flight of 2000km is any more costly than a drive of 200km or a bike ride of 80km or a stroll of 10km. Each takes about the same time. Anywhere that takes over a day to reach is a "long way" regardless of transport method.

This is why freeways don't work. Build a big freeway to reduce travel times and people just choose to travel further.

You've got me started on this! Live locally. Sell your car. Make the choices that give you back a sense of community and happiness. Everything I love is made worse by cars (and planes; to get back on topic, sort of).