Retired Delta Airlines captain Karlene Petitt reported that a pilot from another airline, flying on Delta, noticed that the plane had incorrect safety briefing cards in the seat back pocket.
The flight was operated by a Boeing 757, but there were some seats with cards for a Boeing 737. The flight had to be delayed, eventually 10 incorrect cards were found, and fortunately this was in Atlanta and they had the correct cards to replace them with – otherwise the plane could not fly.
Hope @Delta doesn't have emergency evacuation. #Pilot from an other airline found 10 "B737" emergency cards on the "B757" Told the #Captain. Captain pissed. Had to ground plane in #Atlanta or fix it…did they? #Travelers @FAANews #SafetyFirst #avgeeks @CBSNews @abcnews pic.twitter.com/uPpl68kmzK
— Karlene Petitt (@KarlenePetitt) March 9, 2024
Safety cards are required by law in commercial aircraft. FAR Part 121.571(b) requires that air carriers operating under Part 121 must provide safety briefings or cards that explain the use of safety belts, emergency exits, life jackets, oxygen masks, and floor proximity lighting systems in case of an emergency. These regulations ensure that passengers have access to critical safety information that could aid in their survival during an emergency situation.
The idea is to ensure passengers are prepared for emergencies, enhancing their ability to react correctly and efficiently in critical situations. There’s a safety briefing, either by video or performed by flight attendants, but these offer a visual format that can be understood regardless of language proficiency and a way to reinforce the message.
These cards have evolved significantly over time. The first ones were minimalist and text-heavy. They’ve shifted to become more graphic-oriented, using universal symbols and simplified illustrations. The FAA and ICAO have updated requirements to include more detailed information on brace positions, emergency exits, and flotation devices, reflecting changes in safety protocols, aircraft design, and lessons learned from past incidents. Here’s what’s currently supposed to be on each card.
- On the one hand, I’m surprised though that these haven’t evolved to become more digital, incorporated into airline mobile apps.
- On the other hand, maybe that’s because they aren’t actually helpful? I’m not aware of any incident where a life saved in an emergency has been shown to be the result of a safety briefing card.
- We just assume that passengers internalize the information, and so it’s important to have the cards. However overall engagement with safety cards is generally low.
Perhaps augmented reality or virtual reality could create immersive experiences that passengers would actually engage with and experience emergencies in advance that would actually prepare them?
As cards placed in seat back pockets, though, it seems like delaying a flight is fairly oficious. It’s something the airline could be fined for, but is it actually a safety concern?
The Italian government recently stopped a British Airways flight from departing when it was discovered that seat cushions at the exit row were too large. They had to find smaller seat cushions for use in that row, didn’t have any at the airport, but scavenged other seats and found some to swap out.
At least there the idea is that the more substantive seat cushions might protrude into the exit row and slow down an evacuation.
Petitt had a long-running dispute with her airline over her fitness to fly.
Gary writes : “I’m surprised though that these haven’t evolved to become more digital , incorporated into airline mobile apps.” …
Well , Gary , I happen to be deaf , so I cannot hear the FA’s announcement ; I happen to Not own a mobile phone ; and I Do read the cards , and look around for my position relative to the emergency exit .
Your sentence betrays an infatuation with your mobile phone , rather than an interest in actually reading and understanding a document .
I agree with the pilot holding the flight until the proper information was in the seatback pockets. I almost aways read the safety cards and often skip looking at the seatbelt demonstrations. One thing I look at is the aircraft model. I also locate my nearest exit. On my Thursday AirAsia flight it was to the rear.
I’d assume the cards are most helpful when the emergency is known before landing so people have a few minutes to review it.
Brown m and m theory. If the airline has messed up something as basic, common, and normal as the safety cards – what else have they got wrong.
That’s why, “thought leader”.
Were to fly from Joplin, Missouri to Kansas City on a Great Lakes Beech 1900D in 2007. Flight delayed for 2 hours due to one missing safety card. Mechanic had to be called out of bed at 6:00 AM to certify the aircraft for flight. My wife and I then had to scramble through MCI and DET in order to get our ongoing connections.
Well, it looks like in the process of distributing the cards, Delta ran a little short.
So, it appears like Delta is not playing with a full deck.
I don’t see what Karlene Pettit’s “long standing issues” with her employer has to do with what she found and reported. That’s irrelevant. Are you are trying to hint that she had something to do with the wrong cards on the aircraft? Given the number of wrong cards, that’s ludicrous.
The fact is that Delta’s aircraft cleaners (these days, they may well be contractors), made a mistake that had to be corrected before flight.
From this retired airline supervisor’s/writer’s perspective, you didn’t have a story without mentioning Ms. Pettit’s employment issues. Tsk. I expect better from you, Mr. Leff.
I don’t see what Karlene Pettit’s “long standing issues” with her employer have to do with what she found and reported. That’s irrelevant. Are you are trying to hint that she had something to do with the wrong cards on the aircraft? Given the number of wrong cards, that’s ludicrous.
The fact is that Delta’s aircraft cleaners (these days, they may well be contractors), made a mistake that had to be corrected before flight.
From this retired airline supervisor’s/writer’s perspective, you didn’t have a story without mentioning Ms. Pettit’s employment issues. Tsk. I expect better from you, Mr. Leff.
There seems to be little common sense in the inflexibility of the.regulations. Why can’t they simply have a ‘12-hour’ rule or something? For the flight where this kind of issue was discovered, make sure every row has at least 1 card, have passengers in an improperly supplied row acknowledge that they have read one of the cards, and then be required to stock the correct cards within 12 hours. This way, your delay is maybe a half hour instead of hours. I had this happen with a lit exit sign cover. The light itself worked, someone took the plastic ‘exit’ cover. 4 hour delay because someone had to drive the cover down from another city. Just give the passengers a more intense instruction on where the exit is, and replace within 12 hours. 15 minute delay.
Problem discovered and corrected properly. Why crucify a company for something like this? They did the right thing.
Retired captain here. Once had a flight delayed for several hours when F/A noticed an incorrect decal on the aft door slide. Decal said slide raft but it was just a slide. (overwater vs non aircraft)
Even though we were at a hub they couldn’t find the correct decal. Finally swapped the whole raft cover from another aircraft in the maintenance hangar.
Seems trivial but it’s the rule.
@greggb57 … +1 . Also , Ms. Pettit was Exonerated .
More nonsense caused by government stupidity.
The correct safety card is my security blanket (a la Linus of Peanuts cartoon.) I often peruse them and enjoy the tactile feel of traditional card paper. I am glad that government regs and airline association policy continue to afford me, the actual passenger, this comfort.
Relative to Karlene Petitt, I want to thank Gary for posting her Blog. For anyone who did not bother to read it, I’d encourage doing so, I was horrified to hear what she went through. I’m aware that a number of pilots are regulars on this forum, so please let me know if I’m misinterpreting this somehow.
An example of why modern society is so stupid. Delaying a flight over something hardly anyone reads. As a child I used to read the safety card religiously, but I can’t say in retrospect I was in any way safer because of it now having studied aviation, airframe construction, and aeronautics. Bureaucracy nitpicks over things that make people no safer but ignores the violent criminals pouring over the border.
David, James, I beg to disagree.
1) David, your comment about illegals is irrelevant and an attempt to interject politics into an aviation forum. It’s inappropriate.
James, not government stupidity.
Walter has a good point, but it’s likely the cleaner’s fault. They’re under a lot of time pressure to clean and restock things like seat cards and sick sacks. I should know. I did it as part of my job for many years.
Let the political lie fight begin.
“Pie fight.” ^^
@alert… you may represent 0.003% of the population. As Joey would say “It is Moo point”.
Why did you choose a headline like ‘Delta Flight Grounded…’ instead of ‘Delta Flight Delayed…’?” I had higher expectations from you. It seems like the former headline was chosen to attract more readers to the article. I think it’s not right to sensationalize news like Fox and CNN do. If you continue down this path, it might result in losing readers.
@greggb57 I think you missing the pattern and motivation. There is a 18 year old kid in Germany who calls himself “Citation Commander”. He filed 4,000 complaints last year. Not a very credible source. Just like this nut-job
Not sure why entire flight must be delayed or cancelled if at an outstation without replacement cards. If full, maybe ten pax to be removed, as if the seat is blocked? More practically, when discovered, they aren’t allowed to read seat neighbors card?
Thinking like a lawyer, I wonder if at least part of the requirement to have an appropriate safety card at every seat is to protect the airline. Should any unusual event occur, the passenger can’t claim they didn’t read the safety card because they didn’t have one.
@greggb57 – I felt like if I was going to write about an incident where she was calling out Delta, then it’s important context that she has a history with the airline and reason to be quite angry with them. I put it at the end, but it would be malpractice not to include it at all.
@Gary, Please now! You placed her history with Delta in your first sentence in the email promoting the post.
Read The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes – and Why
That book outlines why the safety card is there and Why you should read it.
FAA Requires one safety brifing card per row and one safety briefing card for every seat in overwing exit row. Now each airline and aircraft can have different requirements per the FAA.
Oh come on, Gary. Her dispute with Delta has nothing to do with it. She simply reported what another pilot had found. To categorize your inclusion of it as avoiding “malpractice” is laughable.
To hear a fabulous roast of Ed Bastian by her attorney, sing to the tune of Sam Cooke’s “Don’t Know Much,” definitely click on her blog.
so what’s the point of the attendants standing and demonstrating safety guides and features then, as well as exit rows, which are clearly marked? And truthfully, how many passengers anymore are first time passengers unable to navigate protocol without ubiquitous help? My god we are the nanny state and helpless against the onslaught against common sense.
@davidarnett
i’m not worried about the so-called ‘violent criminals’ coming across the border – i’m concerned about the violent maga trump cult traitors who killed police and “hunted” for others to publicly execute during their violent storming of our sacred democratic institutions!
VERY glad this was not deregulated.to the airlines.
If it were, it would be like toilets — let’s just leave without them functioning, as it’s cheaper (OK, maybe not on Delta, but on AA for sure).
Having the correct cards is a regulation. In the airline industry we follow the regulations. These rules may seem trivial to outsiders, but they have been refined over the years to give the US unparalleled aviation safely. Perhaps some of the commenters above can tell me which of the regulations they’re ok with the industry disregarding, and which ones they’d like us to follow?
Aviation compliance is 100% mandantory for good reason. If this has to be explained to anyone, I am not wasting my time.
Airworthiness is determined by paper and documentation. If its required, and not there, the plane is not airworthy. Period. Waivers may exist, or certain exceptions, but again those are written rules that must be adhered to. Flying an unairworthy plane, being out of compliance, leads to big fines or even regulatory penalties.
This may have been an error by a contracted cabin cleaning company, not necessarily by certified cabin crew members who simply expected for everyone involved to do their job properly.
I don’t read the cards but sometimes I look at the illustrations for fun.
Now I know not to report s wrong card.
Now I know not to report a wrong card
To me wrong safety cards reflect quality issues at the airline. If they can’t even put the correct safety cards in seat backs what other hidden maintenance issues are being done wrong.
First off…brand recognition. Like “Coca-Cola” and “Coke” refers to the drink. He works for “Coke” is incorrect. He works for “The Coca-Cola Company.” They are quite snotty about that. Delta is referred to as “Delta” or “Delta Air Lines”…three words. Being in the business, Gary should know that. Stopping the flight to correct the safety card issue is absolutely correct. The minimum equipment list (MEL) dictates a go/no go situation. The reason that the safety card is paper? Paper can be read when there is no power on the aircraft. There are safety cards in Braille, too. Flight attendants are trained to be aware that a sightless person is going to need help getting off of the aircraft in an emergency situation.
Win Whitmire is just another butthurt Delta employee or fanboy to complain about the coverage of their precious delta Airlines (like that?). Guess what Whitmire? Nobody really cares about DAL except Tim Dunn.
I think this is a very legitimate gripe.
Do we watch the safety briefing? No–because we’ve seen it many times before and a plane’s a plane. There are standard seat belts. There are standard masks. Doors have slides. Overwater there will be a vest under my seat.
What does differ from plane to plane are the emergency exits. I could spend a few minutes watching the safety demo to get that information, or I could pull out the card and see where the exits are on that bird. I can get the information 10x faster by looking at the card, then go back to reading my book. Paper is wonderful for that, letting you skip to the parts you need.
Having the wrong cards is especially bad because it’s much worse to believe wrong information than it is to know you don’t have the information and thus will try to obtain the correct information. Same as things which don’t work have to be marked inoperative.
It’s a little SUS that this retired pilot found safety cards for the wrong plane on her flight. I wouldn’t be surprised if she planted ten random cards throughout the craft when she was boarding.
This article itself shouldn’t have warranted coverage, and the incident could have been corrected at the point of discovery.
Because she decided to tweet her “discovery,” journalists are in the very right to investigate the source, and her employment history with the company is fair game.
Says alot about passengers who don’t care that the Aircraft probably went weeks without the correct card.
I can see people reading this article taking safety cards from one plane and putting them in a different plane just to cause havoc.
If they can’t figure out the right safety cards to put in the plane, how can they be trusted to maintain the rest of the plane?
Can’t legally fly with incorrect cards onboard. Planes grounded until requirements met.
To greggb57 and the other nut jobs who state that airline service and safety issues are caused by airlines that under DEI are being forced to employ underqualified/unskilled individuals at the peril of the public. Such statements are made through innuendo without the support of any empirical data. In other words, such people are insane.
P. crowley, I guess my 20+ years in the airlines makes me an uninformed nut job? And exactly what are your qualifications and expertise? I’ll wait…
greggb57
With what you were stating, “YES”. It just proves your prejudices. By the way, I worked within Lockheed in Burbank for about 15 years (up through the discontinuation of the L1011.)