[spdustin]

It's been my assertion, as both a solo passenger and one traveling with a child, that crying babies and toddlers are the result of one of two things:

1) Kids need to be chewing something, or sucking on a nipple/bottle/straw to help facilitate inner-ear pressure changes. Most aren't, and those that can't say "my ears hurt" simply scream.

2) Kids who are tired (because they're kids or because their parents figured "I'll tire him out so he sleeps on the flight") and get startled by a scary loud voice saying things they don't understand. Like yours - probably a tuckered out toddler desperate to rest, no?

(Edited to avoid sounding like I was disagreeing with parent comment)

[k2enemy]

Great tips for flying with kids in general. I'm pretty confident that these particular instances were due to the announcements as things instantly went from happy to crying "it hurts! loud!" with hands over ears, then back to (relatively) happy once it was over.