A Delta Air Lines passenger shares that after misconnecting in Atlanta while enroute to San Francisco on Sunday, they got moved from their extra legroom seat to a middle seat in the back of a flight Monday morning. And they had words with the woman in the window seat beside them.
They were back in row 37. The woman at the window in 37F made clear that she was entitled to the armrest at the window – and to the armrest between them, ‘I paid for my seat and I’m taking it up with my arm on the armrest!’
I put my elbow on the armrest between our seats. I’ve made sure not to cross into her space. Since pushback, though, she began using her arm to try to push mine off.
I tried to quietly but firmly take a stand by simply keeping my arm in place. About 39 minutes after takeoff, she told me that I need to move my arm… [but] this is also my assigned seat, am staying within the bounds of it, she had room to lean the other way, but I have nowhere else to go. She told me again she chose her seat, it’s not her problem that I’m in the middle but to get off the armrest.
The woman at the window fell asleep with the man in the middle seat taking up a portion of the armrest beside her with his elbow.
It appears to me that the was a Delta Boeing 757, which gets a bit tight back there. (It had to be a 757 because both the Boeing 757 and 767 have more than 37 rows, but E is an aisle seat on the 767. The passenger misconnected, and had to take a flight the next morning, so that would have been the 8:10 a.m. flight 785.) This was definitely a domestic narrowbody aircraft.
And in economy on a domestic narrowbody flight like this one there are generally three seats on each side of the plane. Correct default armrest allocation is as follows:
- The passenger at the window gets the armrest next to the window
- The passenger at the aisle gets the armrest next to the aisle
- The passenger in the middle gets two armrests
For the enterprising amongst you, armrests can be shared using an armrest divider. Passengers use armrests flight after flight, day after day, on airline after airline – without significant deleterious effect. While it’s not comfortable to have to share armrests, that’s the product you’re buying, and the passenger at the window certainly doesn’t have more of a claim to it than the one at the middle.
Yep – would have zero problem telling it it is shared between the 2 seats but typical etiquette is to allow the person in the middle seat to have the middle armrests since they have no other space. I’d let her know that being the case I would share it but I would not give her the entire armrest and she could call a flight attendant if she didn’t agree. Not sure why people are so passive now and can’t handle situations on their own.
Pick your battles. I’d give the woman the armrest, but I’d give her an earful about how feminism was a mistake and she’ll never make partner at any law firm.
Armrests can be shared. One person uses a little at the base (back) and the other person, usually the middle seat, gets about 80% of the armrest.
That way, the window and aisle seat passengers get 120% of an armrest and the middle seat person gets 160% of an armrest.
Both have right to that armrest. Ask any flight attendant. None will say it is exclusive to one seat or the other to the degree that that they would kick someone off of the flight. If I needed the room, as I likely would have in the middle seat, the battle would last the entire flight. She could have bought an extra seat for comfort if she needed that armrest that much. Actually battling it out would be more fun than being bored stiff on the flight.
In situations like this, I must admit that I cannot control my farts. Let them rip. RIP.
Pry and remove the armrest out of it’s anchor , and hand it to her : “Here … here is your armrest.”