[orev]

This is what most people seem to get wrong about airplane seat belts—they are not there for the same reason as in cars: crashes. They are there to keep people from flying around and getting injured during turbulence.

Crashes in commercial planes are so rare that any single one almost always makes the news, while turbulence is extremely common. Let’s be fair and say that a seatbelt is not going to make a whit of difference when colliding with the ground at 200 MPH, so a 2 or 5 point harness are essentially the same in that regard. But a belt is plenty to help with turbulence.

Will there be a few instances, such as yours, where the extra protection would have been good? Of course, but there’s also a trade-off of weight, cost, and public resistance to strapping in like a race car driver. The other mitigations seem to work well enough when there is a situation.

[gxqoz]

I was reading a recent article on the NSTB's increased focus on reducing injuries from airplane turbulence and was surprised how low the baseline currently is.

"Accidents on U.S. airlines have become increasingly rare except for one category of in-flight mishap that has remained stubbornly prevalent: turbulence that leads to serious injuries.

More than 65% of severe injuries — or 28 of 43 — logged by U.S. accident investigators from 2017 through 2020 on airliners resulted from planes encountering bumpy skies, triggered by atmospheric conditions that could be worsening due to climate change."

Sure, let's reduce injuries. But 7 serious injuries per year seems quite good already compared to injuries from other forms of transportation. I wonder how many people are injured on shuttle buses to airports that lack seat belts. I'd have to guess it's more than that.

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/turbulence-continues-t...

[gumby]

This is a good point: the number of such incidents is so low the cost (including social resistance) doesn't make it worth it.

I would like it because I mostly sleep on the plane. Also I take a lot of transoceanic flights (or did pre covid) which seem to have more turbulence than transcontinental ones (perhaps less discretion for rerouting, especially ETOPS flights?).

I miss the back-facing seats which I always chose when I had the option, as they are much safer (except for the risk of flying debris).

[jmercouris]

Turbulence that results in people flying out of their seats is exceedingly rare, like a once in a lifetime experience for a commercial pilot. Airplanes will go to great lengths to avoid bad weather to avoid stressing the airframe and making passengers uncomfortable.

[borski]

Anecdotally, I've been on more planes with lots of turbulence (that without the seat belt would have been potentially damaging) than I can count on two hands. I've never been in a plane crash. :)

I imagine part of the reason people don't fly out of their seats today is, well, seatbelts, but also likely depends on the airline/pilots as well.