Do Pilots Dream of Electric Geese?

November 26, 2016 10:42 PM

Pilots and flight attendants on flights longer than about 10 hours are required to have places to sleep. On the longest-haul flights, these are required to be flat and isolated from passengers. Want to take a peek at where your flight attendants and pilots sleep when taking you from New York to Mumbai or Dubai to Panama? I'll bet you do!

Pilot rest areas are typically separate from the cabin crew rest area, a little more spacious, and on modern planes are separated from the passenger cabin (accessible only from the cockpit) so pilots don't have to exit the secure cockpit area to sleep; these collections contain both pilot and cabin crew rest areas. Another note: "entrances" to the cabin crew quarters on the Boeing 777-300 through the baggage compartments above the cabin are actually emergency exits (you can see 2/3 of the way down this page); there's a traditional steep-stair entrance behind a door for normal use. This is why you've never seen a flight attendant climb out of a baggage compartment during a flight despite the pictures above. Flight attendants note that pictures where the sleeping quarters look sleek and well-lit, or have living-room-type pillows, are Airbus and Boeing marketing mockups; the real deal is darker, grimier, has airline pillows, and features lots of emergency equipment like phones and fire extinguishers and grab bars mucking up the pretty sleek lines.

Even more, with some repeats.

Short videos: Boeing 787 pilot rest area - 787 cabin crew bunks - Boeing 777 cabin crew rest area - Lufthansa A380 lower deck cabin crew rest area - More A380 crew - A380 pilot rest area - Boeing 747 cabin crew rest area

posted by Eyebrows McGee (21 comments total)

Like a coffin? That? Luxury!

That 747 bunkroom looks like a 688, except only 2-high instead of 3-high. Plus, on the 688 the mattress tray lifts up and there's about 6 inches depth there to keep everything you own. If you're lucky enough to get one and not to have to just throw a mattress in the torpedo room when they're not using it.

(Oh, and you live there for months)
posted by ctmf at 11:28 PM on November 26, 2016 [14 favorites]

With all these flights you know that some young couple has made a pillow fort in there.
posted by adept256 at 11:48 PM on November 26, 2016 [1 favorite]

Is that what they're calling it these days?
posted by lefty lucky cat at 12:14 AM on November 27, 2016 [8 favorites]

A lot of the articles in the mainstream press were like "heh heh I bet they get up to stuff" but all the "flyer talk" type boards the crew were like "a) ew, no, it smells like feet and it's dirty and b) you definitely get fired, nobody does it." They said crew nookie is for the hotel the airline pays for on the layover.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:19 AM on November 27, 2016 [22 favorites]

Please! Let us keep our mile-high dreams, even if they now smell of feet.
posted by sebastienbailard at 12:39 AM on November 27, 2016 [2 favorites]

FYI the second link there is to the Daily Mail, if anyone is trying to avoid clicking on their site & doesn't spot it in time :( ...
posted by AFII at 12:48 AM on November 27, 2016 [14 favorites]

Like a coffin? That? Luxury!

OMfG YES yes yes! Just to be able to stretch out for a few hours rather than carefully shifting and positioning to avoid triggering a muscle cramp. It's always seemed to me that rows of coffin like slots could be stacked more efficiently than chairs (may require meds for some passengers but what the heck).
posted by sammyo at 2:18 AM on November 27, 2016 [5 favorites]

Maybe on the shorter flights when it's not in use it can be converted to a baby prison childcare center.
posted by adept256 at 3:03 AM on November 27, 2016 [14 favorites]

The arrangement of bunks looks like sleeping accommodation in the cheaper carriages of long-distance train services in parts of the world (China, I think, might have similar trains). I imagine the reason that they can't offer it to passengers, who instead have to make do with ordinary upright seats or else shell out for space-consuming luxury seats, would be because you'd need flight crew training to be able to evacuate in an emergency.
posted by acb at 3:30 AM on November 27, 2016 [3 favorites]

So timely! i just flew a long-haul flight yesterday, and was wondering about this. I would much rather prefer if planes were like the Chinese bunk-style trains -- 2 or 3 rows of beds (with, somehow, the best, coziest comforters ever), with a hallway to one side that has little stools and tables attached to the wall, in case you wanted to sit, eat, etc. When I start Fig Airlines, I'll try this.
posted by Fig at 7:09 AM on November 27, 2016 [3 favorites]

Not so different from a band tour bus, it seems. They also smell of feet.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:28 AM on November 27, 2016 [1 favorite]

I'm not a girl, but do you gals spend a lot of time laying on your stomachs, reading, with you knees bent and your feet in the air? It seems that way.
posted by humboldt32 at 8:14 AM on November 27, 2016 [2 favorites]

you'd need flight crew training to be able to evacuate in an emergency

If there's a *real* emergency, I'll probably find myself evacuating without any special training whatsoever...
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 8:50 AM on November 27, 2016 [4 favorites]

Not so different from a band tour bus, it seems. They also smell of feet.

“Feet” is the aroma of rock'n'roll.
posted by acb at 10:01 AM on November 27, 2016 [1 favorite]

I'm not a girl, but do you gals spend a lot of time laying on your stomachs, reading, with you knees bent and your feet in the air? It seems that way.

Hell, no. I read in an armchair or sitting up with my back on a pillow. I never read that way. Others may have different experiences, but that would put a cramp in my back.
posted by Peach at 11:50 AM on November 27, 2016 [2 favorites]

Thanks, I've wanted to know what these spaces are like for a long time.

(But now I'm reminded of Lucky Air.)
posted by Rash at 1:47 PM on November 27, 2016

This explains why you can't find a United flight attendant for hours between GRU and IAH.
posted by wintermind at 3:00 PM on November 27, 2016

Good news: Airliners have cozy little hidey-holes in them. Bad news: I will never get to use them.
posted by ckape at 9:19 PM on November 27, 2016 [1 favorite]

Thanks, I'm about to hop a flight back to the US from S. Africa and was totally wondering how the crew got some much needed down time.
posted by evilDoug at 9:29 PM on November 27, 2016 [1 favorite]

That 747 bunkroom looks like a 688, except only 2-high instead of 3-high.

I did a tour (the tourist kind not the military kind) of an Oberon-class sub and it occurred to me that if you were going to sail on one of these things you had to be the kind of person who didn't mind spending months never being more than an arms-length away from another person, including while bathing or taking a crap.
posted by um at 10:10 PM on November 27, 2016

Yeah, you definitely don't get much exercise of your long-distance vision. On the other hand, if you're hiring, and one of the skills you're looking for is a superhuman ability to get along with even the most annoying of people for long periods of time without stabbing anyone, a submariner is your person.
posted by ctmf at 9:08 AM on November 28, 2016 [6 favorites]