Early in the pandemic public health officials had us scrubbing our groceries and quarantining our packages. The CDC used a flu model to describe how Covid-19 spread, even though it was clear very early on from work understanding spread in a South Korean call center and a restaurant in China that it was aerosols we needed to be worried about, not fomites.
Still, we’ve adopted a certain hygiene theater that includes cleaning and disinfecting, and it persists to this day. Personally I am glad that it does. Many places lacked sufficient cleaning. But we haven’t done enough to deal with aerosols, such as improving ventilation in schools and many offices.
Airlines have touted HEPA air filtration and downward air flow as making the cabin environment far safer than other indoor congregant settings. They’re largely silent, though, about issues like:
- The airport itself, from security to the gate, where passengers gather without the benefit of this filtration
- The boarding and deplaning process. United Airlines stands out for running the APU on the ground to generate airflow and benefit from this, but many airlines do not
What airlines have continued to do is tout their cleaning procedures, even when it’s clear that there aren’t very good cleaning procedures in place. When you board an American Airlines flight the app will tell you your plane has been sanitized and is ready to board. And then twitter is littered with things like this American Airlines first class seat:
This is not acceptable. https://t.co/EKob2qQsH6
— gary leff (@garyleff) February 7, 2022
This was AA2068 on 2/6 from LGA to CLT. Seat 2C. Though when I asked other people in first class, every seat was exactly the same. Simply disgusting – as if they hadn’t been cleaned in weeks. Overhead bins filthy. The “enhanced cleaning” is all talk.
— aolcese (@canon1324) February 7, 2022
The truth is planes do get sanitized with long-lasting sprays – not every day or between every flight. They may get a light cleaning between flights, but not so much cleaning as to delay a flight. You’ll find crumbs, trash in seat pockets, and goodness knows what else.
That’s probably not going to give you Covid-19, but it is disgusting, and customers deserve better. Historically cleaning was one of the first things to get cut during challenging economic times. Airline ‘deep cleans’ used to happen just every year or year and a half which is just gross.
To be clear it’s the passengers who make the messes and we should all be more mindful, too. But I’m paying for a basic product from an airline that at a minimum includes safe, clean transportation. Even if the airline isn’t the one making the mess, they’re the one selling the product.
Credit: Mary Burd
Covid-19 notwithstanding many of us have come to focus on cleanliness in our lives, and prefer to associate with brands who share the same values. And at the very lease airlines that aren’t doing thorough cleans between flights need to stop implying that they are – because it just calls attention to the disconnect when passengers board the plane.
I’ve got this beat. I’ve had FIVE flights in 2022 on Delta operated by SkyWest without either (a) a functioning lavatory or (b) potable water to wash your hands in the lavatory.
Former airline supervisor here. I used to clean planes between flights and on overnights for about twenty years.
NEVER EVER stick your hand in a seat pocket without looking first. This was covered in our training. I know of at least one person who got a used syringe on his hand.
To be fair, the clean airlines also need to stop promoting covidian hygiene theater because no amount of alcohol, ammonia, or novel concoctions and probable carcinogens is going to prevent the spread of an *airborne* disease…
Yet Covid is the reason we don’t have decent food on AA anymore….
APU running on every AA flight I have boarded in the last year or so. Probably depends on temperature outside. Very hot or very cold it is mandatory. Also find the newer planes on AA have much healthier air. No excuse for poor cleaning. Hawaiian just do not seem to do it at all inter island.
Dirtiest airline is Air Canada. They put on the video on how they clean planes, and then when you wipe down your seat in J or Y, your wipe comes out black
Its airborne , not the mess the passengers leave behind….
We should have a global discussion about Fomites vs Aerosol. We’d soon realize all the sanitizer stations and hand-washing orders distracted us from the real solution here.
Yes, I got a flight from Santiago de Chile to Buenos Aires on Air Canada. I thought there was a spider or bug on the table but it turned out to be someone’s fake eyelashes (very obviously used with mascara caked on them. Yuk
The most dangerous (from a COVID point of view) part of flying to the USA is the two hour tightly packed line waiting for immigration. No amount of detritus left behind by previous passengers can come close to the danger organised by the US Government, which has even switched off its electronic machines to ensure that the process is even slower for non-citizens.
American sends a text announcing that your flight has been sanitized and is ready to board. If they did not actually sanitize between flights, that would be misleading, if not dangerous. Not to mention most of the crowded airport transportation with little or no social distancing: packed parking shuttles, rental car shuttles, hotel shuttles, inter-terminal shuttles and trams, gate shuttles to small aircraft. And then there’s, the crowds at ticket/luggage check-in lines, and luggage carousels.
Why is it that you have to be tested before your flight and/or show vaccination status when flying from any international location to the US, but not if you are flying from Seattle to JFK or any other domestic location? We even require people from countries with lower covid rates than ours to be vaccinated or tested before arriving in the US, but not state to state. Therefore, you might be safer on an international flight.
@Gary, yes, I agree that airlines shouldn’t lie about ‘plane cleaning, which is exactly what they are doing either directly or by omission, i.e., not stating explicitly *when* the aircraft was cleaned.
But really, this isn’t a COVID issue and hasn’t been for me for years. I have always wiped my seat area and seat off with my own alcohol wipes. A practice that was reinforced for me when an AA Flagship First seat in Hong Kong returned black wipes from the seat. That was pre-COVID when I was more concerned with aerotoxic syndrome, but that’s another discussion.
But at least folk don’t look at you as if you’ve gone out when you wipe down any more….
Some people are pigs.
ChrisNY, good for you. Totally agree. I try to leave a plane as I found it. Maybe airlines should impose cleaning surcharges like hotels do if you trash the room.
Flew Delta One with a really dirty storage compartment. Shame on Delta.
Yuck!
It’s all Kabuki theater. Sadly there are enough people who still buy into it and derive some sort of feeling of safety from it. We’re governed to protect the lowest common denominator in society. Don’t believe me. Look at warning labels on products.
Continue to AMAZED at European Airlines and airports with their common practice of using buses from airport gates to the airplane. They frequently stuff the buses full of passengers and wait 20 minutes or more to depart the terminal or wait to board the plane. These buses have little to no filtration heck there are hardly any seats. Its standing room only, cheek-by-jowel. I have experienced this in the last 10 months flying business class in Istanbul, Munich, Athens.
Very tiring to listen to the airlines telling me how they are concerned with my health and safety. I’ll manage my health and safety because they can’t.
And AC is the worst. By far. Their planes are filthy in all classes.