Female cabin crew at Hainan Airlines – and only women – face immediate suspension if they are 10% above the airline’s ‘standard’ weight limit for their height, as part of the carrier’s image program. It seems to be hurting their image more than helping it, however.
The airline’s program works as follows:
- Standard weight. “height (cm) minus 110 = standard weight (kg)”
- Female flight attendants, up to 5% overweight. Monthly weight monitoring with face-to-face reviews.
- Female flight attendants, 5% – 10% overweight. Weekly weight checks.
- Female flight attendants, 10% overweight. Immediate suspension, supervised weight reduction plans.
The goal is to maintain a “professional image.” Is this standard, promulgated this month, having the desired effect? It’s certainly being criticized. On the other hand,
- People are talking about Hainan Airlines
- And the criticism is marketing ‘our cabin crew are attractive’
So maybe this will actually drive ticket sales? And no doubt they could use the help of a guerilla marketing campaign. At one point HNA Group holdings included:
- At least a portion of Chinese airlines such as Beijing Capital Airlines; Fuzhou Airlines; Hainan Airlines; HK Express; Hong Kong Airlines; Lucky Air; Tianjin Airlines; and Urumqi Air
- Stakes in international airlines such as Azul, Virgin Australia, South Africa’s Comair and TAP Air Portugal
- Interests in NH Hotels, Red Lion Hotels, Radisson Hotels, Swissport, ICE – International Currency Exchange, and Rio de Janeiro–Galeão International Airport
- Plus being the largest investor in Hilton
- Airline caterers Gate Group and Servair
These acquisitions entailed a mount of debt which the company couldn’t service even before $10 billion was embezzled. Before the pandemic they worked to reduce a debt load that exceeded $100 billion by selling off assets, but continued to face problems paying for fuel, problems paying employees, and problems paying investors. HNA even offered investors airline airline tickets in lieu of interest payments. And two years ago the airline’s CEO was taken away by police.
They even turned off inflight entertainment systems because they couldn’t pay licensing fees. Seven of their grounded planes were seized by Hong Kong airport over unpaid fees. They entered bankruptcy with $75 billion owed even after selling off assets.
And focusing on cabin crew appearance is hardly unheard of even in today’s climate. Air India required flight attendants they deemed overweight to lose 5 pounds per month and Malaysia Airlines fired a female flight attendant for being 1.5 pounds overweight for her height, based on the airline’s standards. Malaysian carrier Malindo Air actually required flight attendant job candidates to remove their tops in interviews (“It is the right of the employer to request potential flight attendants to expose their chests to interviewers…[because] cabin crew needed to be presentable”).
This is disgusting objectification of women. The feminist movement in Asian countries is behind the times, compared to western countries, but will catch up quickly. On the topic of weight, I would support a program that prohibits PASSENGERS from flying, at least in the economy cabin, if they are 10% overweight.
@ Alison
Same thing was expected of us male pilots at my overseas airline. If we were over a certain BMI we would be put on probation and if after 3 months we didn’t meet weight standards we would be terminated. Is that a disgusting objectification of men? Or just standards?
@Alison If the women’s weight is going to be monitored the men should be too. I would have liked to monitor myself throughout the years. Have my weight in proportion to my height. It’s a lot easier to lose 5 pounds than 50. I don’t know anything about flying anywhere except economy but if we are not allowed to be 10% over our weight then business and first class should be treated the same. I agree with a persons statement in a previous post that if the airlines hadn’t shrunk the spaces maybe we wouldn’t have to deal with people spilling out of their seats and others being mashed.
It would be interesting to have the formula applied to both men and women and then compare the results. At lest one US airline in the late 1970s used a similar formula, and the results were that roughly 19% of the female applicants qualified while around 85% of the men did. So the issue isn’t just using the same formula but seeing the results of its application.
I would have to be 103 lbs. I am athletic and healthy at 125 lbs and wear a size 2. That’s crazy.
Great this is their decision why we care?
So much for Socialism & Communism looking out for the Workers. This is another reason not to fly a Chinese Airline.
That formula is very flawed. The standard BMI formula goes at the square of height rather than linear with height. At my college size I was below that threshold. Now that the decades have robbed me of a bit of height that would worry my doctor if I was that low. At my wife’s college size I do not know if she would be alive at that weight–and now that the decades have taken their toll on her that’s little more than just her bones.
In my limited experience on Chinese airlines they do seem to favor young and attractive flight attendants. It’s not just Hainan.
Good policy, I’d rather be served my dog food in steerage by a smoke show than the lazy bloated pigs I see on United.
Lol cecil has never flown a plane in their life
Wow, real cesspool in the comments for this one.
Anyway, *even if* you were trying to screen out fat flight attendants, this is a ludicrous formula. On this formula, a 5’6″ woman needs to be below 137.5 pounds or be fired. Many female athletes would flunk that standard, because it doesn’t account for muscle mass. If they actually did a body fat test at least that would be in line with the goal. This is just dumb. But it raises the question, why are they even bother pretending to have a standard? Obviously they’re not worried about any kind of non-discrimination law or other employment litigation, so why not just arbitrarily fire whichever ones some manager decides have got ugly? It’s not as if the “standard” improves the PR profile of the policy. Nobody who objects to firing overweight flight attendants is going to say, “Oh well, they have an objective standard, so I guess that’s fair then.”
@alison. Spot on. Not until all Asian countries recognize the rights of men who think they are women to be treated equal to men, which they, well, while being treated as a full fledged woman will women have achieved what we here in the US have.
Only the women cabin crew at Hainan Airlines face immediate suspension if they are 10% above the airline’s ‘standard’ weight limit for their height as part of the carrier’s image program. Accordingly, if a Hainan Airlines flight attendant meets this height and weight criteria, will this employee automatically be Red Dress Qualified if they become a flight attendant at Delta Airlines?
Previously, Delta Airlines offered the red dress uniform only to flight attendants wearing a dress size 18 and below, or they would be mandated to wear a less conspicuous blue color dress. Currently, Delta Airlines has not yet followed the lead started at Target stores by offering plus size flight attendant uniforms in the color of “Manatee Gray.”
What a job, sit and look at girls’ chests all day. And get paid for it. Hard day at the office dear?
Those that say this is disgusting standards on women, I’m sure they view America’s weight issue and say its disgusting how one can get so fat or how mutilation from a boy to a girl is disgusting. You want to work there, then comply with the rules. China looking much better as a society than America.
I think the airline is just doing this to save fuel.
This formula is wildly discriminatory. My Thai wife is 140cm tall. She would have to be an extremely anorexic 30kg to comply.
@Tony,
Well just check the Emirates pilot BMI requirements on their recruitment page if you doubt me. 15,000 hrs now, 5,000 at EK, I’m sure I have more than you, but that has nothing to do with the discussion here, just a childish attack since the info I presented adds context and clashes with your preconceived emotional stance on this.