Travelers and flight attendants are already steeling themselves for increased turbulence and weather delays thanks to climate change now face a new problem while on the runway—extreme heat.
Earth is getting warmer, and that’s a problem for everyone, but especially for folks confined to a little metal tube baking on a blacktop runway. Keeping planes cool when they’re on the ground is a struggle and now the U.S. Department of Transportation is looking to limit just how hot flyers and crew members can get, according to the New York Times.
Flight attendants have been pushing for temperature limits since 2018, as they are particularly aware of just how stuffy a fuselage can get:
“I can tell you as an active flight attendant, this is a major problem,” said Sara Nelson, the international president of the Association of Flight Attendants. “Everyone has a story about being too hot on an aircraft and the horrible things that happen as a result.”
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One flight attendant wrote that on an “entire flight we had passengers yelling and cursing at us because it was so hot.”
On another plane, an attendant said, the auxiliary power unit was not working and the temperature was “incredibly high,” adding, “I was hot, dizzy, confused and then blacked out.”
Passengers often report more routine frustrations.
Lauren Gay, a travel writer and social media influencer, said her JetBlue flight from Tampa, Fla., to San Juan, P.R., that was scheduled to take off last Saturday at 7:30 a.m. was delayed an hour because it was 93 degrees inside the cabin. A gate agent told her that passengers could not board until it was 85 degrees or less, she added.
She said she was surprised that the plane had overheated on an early morning flight. “At the time,” she said, “the sun wasn’t even up yet.”
Planes are able to blast freezing cold air at passengers when the jet engines are up and running, but while taxiing on the tarmac or stuck at a gate, things get a little more complicated. It order to condition the air while on the ground, an auxiliary power unit fired by jet fuel can keep things cool inside, or gate workers can attach an external air cooling unit that runs on the plane’s electricity.
There are, of course, problems with these solutions, and the problem is, as always, cost, as pointed out by the Times:
The problem, according to Ross Sagun, an aviation consultant who was an airline pilot for 41 years, is that the external air-conditioning units and auxiliary-powered cooling systems don’t always function properly because of maintenance problems or neglect.
“That situation where things aren’t working well is very common, unfortunately,” he said.
Mr. Sagun also blamed “cost control” for causing planes to overheat. Airlines often encourage pilots to save money on fuel and maintenance by keeping the auxiliary power unit and other engines off while the plane is at the gate or on the runway, he said.
Using too much fuel for air-conditioning on the ground could force a plane to have to refuel, causing delays. Airlines are also under pressure to reduce fuel consumption to help combat climate change.
Luckily, there are some protections for travelers. The Federal Aviation Administration has a rule that airlines must offer passengers a chance to de-plane from domestic flights if delays extend past three hours. Federal law also demands that the cabin and cockpit maintain only a five-degree difference and that the cabin be kept at a comfortable temperature, but there are no specifics on what counts as a comfortable temperature. Airlines, meanwhile, are taking action, even without new federal guidelines. I guess they figured out it’s not good for business to cook either your flight crews or passengers.