This was immensely frustrating and dehumanizing

October 23, 2023 1:34 PM

Air Canada has a bad history with wheelchairs. They break them, lose them, refuse them. This week, the one they left behind belonged to Canada's Chief Accessibility Officer, Stephanie Cadieux.
posted by jacquilynne (21 comments total)

A couple of years ago the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine's Transportation Research Board found that

There appear to be, in this preliminary assessment, no formidable issues that present design and engineering challenges for installing in-cabin wheelchair securement systems in airplanes. While equipping enough airplanes with securement systems to provide meaningful levels of airline service would require substantial effort, the types of cabin modifications required to provide the needed space and structural support would likely be of moderate technical complexity for many individual airplanes.

It's well past time for an international standard for wheelchair securement, along the lines of what All Wheels Up advocates for.

Delta has recently demo'd a concept based around a seat that folds out of the way in order for a chair to be secured in that space, so hopefully this is something that gets real traction sooner rather than later, although the Delta / Air4All design appears to have some notable size limitations in part because the seat remains on the plane rather than being removed— or simply always having at least one dedicated wheelchair space on every regularly scheduled route (or better yet every plane).
posted by jedicus at 1:55 PM on October 23, 2023 [8 favorites]

This also wound up being a pantsing for the dead bird site, as her tweets caused all the scambots to come out of the woodwork in response.
posted by NoxAeternum at 4:23 PM on October 23, 2023

First it was $15M in gold and now this.
posted by porpoise at 4:33 PM on October 23, 2023

Yeah, this was just ridiculous. And yet not so uncommon. Thank you for posting it.

Hard not to feel that if they wanted to do better, they could.
posted by fruitslinger at 6:00 PM on October 23, 2023 [3 favorites]

Flying as a disabled person sucks.
posted by ellieBOA at 6:46 PM on October 23, 2023 [9 favorites]

Ruinous fines for any airline that damages or loses a wheelchair. The full cost of a replacement chair x 3 to be given in cash to the affected person when this happens. The second it cut into the bottom line the issue would be fixed.
posted by signsofrain at 7:23 PM on October 23, 2023 [20 favorites]

Flying as a disabled person sucks.
posted by ellieBOA at 6:46 PM on October 23
[+] [!]

Flying as a person sucks.

As a disabled person, I've been super lucky to only have generally positive experiences. Let's keep the roll going!
posted by Keith Talent at 7:47 PM on October 23, 2023

I hardly know a person in a wheelchair who doesn't have an airline horror story. There needs to be far more aggressive regulation; right now the airlines just don't take the safe and timely transportation of wheelchairs seriously.
posted by praemunire at 9:52 PM on October 23, 2023 [3 favorites]

Hard not to feel that if they wanted to do better, they could.

Air Canada: We're not happy until you're not happy.

The odd thing is that AC is only this way with domestic travel. I had a discussion once with Patrick Smith (of Ask The Pilot) and he seemed genuinely puzzled when I suggested that his generally extremely positive appraisal of AC was not one shared by many Canadians. As he tells it, they have a stellar reputation with international routes. I think I have flown only once or twice with them to destinations abroad, and it seemed... okay, which was, to be fair, also the case with about half of my domestic flights.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 10:05 PM on October 23, 2023 [4 favorites]

Isn’t Air Canada the Amtrak of Canadian skies? They were pulled out of bankruptcy by the Canadian government, who continues to be a major shareholder. No other airline made a reasonable offer to buy them out. If the government hadn’t bought them there would be little to no air transport within Canada. They run on a deficit and can’t be bothered to get their shot together because unless they are sued, there aren’t likely to be any repercussions, and maybe being sued isn’t really an option in Canada (I know nothing about Canadian litigation, so take that comment as is).
posted by waving at 5:38 AM on October 24, 2023 [2 favorites]

Air Canada hasn't typically operated at a loss since it was restructured around 2003-2004, and even that was a result of post-911 market issues and some weird poison pill shenanigans it employed to avoid getting taken over by private equity after the acquisition of Canadian Airlines. It did take a bunch of bailout money during COVID, but what airline didn't?

I don't think Air Canada's problem is that it can't afford not to lose people's wheelchairs.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:47 AM on October 24, 2023 [4 favorites]

I hardly know a person in a wheelchair who doesn't have an airline horror story. There needs to be far more aggressive regulation; right now the airlines just don't take the safe and timely transportation of wheelchairs seriously._{posted by praemunire}

The horror stories are the point. Wheelchair-bound cattle are unprofitable to all airlines in any quantity. And woe be to someone in a wheelchair lashed to the plane when it crashes or has to ditch into the sea -- it's a guaranteed wrongful death settlement. Of course they could require crew to pair off with each wheelchair passenger to assist in unbuckling and exiting and stay with them through rescue, which might just kill both of them.

Much better to just make it sound so unpleasant and potentially dangerous that wheelchair-users self-deselect. It's the invisible hand of the market at work, friends...
posted by zaixfeep at 8:07 AM on October 24, 2023 [1 favorite]

It continues to amaze me that airlines, companies nominally in the business of logistics, are so bad at actually getting people and their goods to where they want to go. To the point that they ask you if you'll actually need anything in checked luggage (medicines, documentation, etc.) before they will take it. The presumption is there is a good chance you'll never see your bag again. (And then force you to check your carryon anyways because they've over stuffed the plane). This despite computerized tracking and facilities locked down tighter than a lot of Canadian prisons.
posted by Mitheral at 8:34 AM on October 24, 2023 [3 favorites]

companies nominally in the business of logistics, are so bad at actually getting people and their goods to where they want to go._{posted by Mitheral}

They are not in the business of logistics, they are in the business of getting paid. What they do to get paid is fungible.

If you don't believe me, consider that Denny's parent company is the former TWA airline. And at one time the company that bought Armour meats and Dial soaps did so to sell and pivot away from being Greyhound Bus Lines. One-time advanced SCSI hardware maker Adaptec sold their whole business and the brand name and instead bought sports trading cards and batting-cage gyms (IIRC); they are now just a generic investment company. And several long-time regional grocery chains got out of that business and leaned into leasing the shopping centers they built for their former stores. You live by Excel, you die by Excel.
posted by zaixfeep at 9:23 AM on October 24, 2023 [3 favorites]

I don't think Air Canada's problem is that it can't afford not to lose people's wheelchairs.

As usual Canadians are screwed by our monopolies. I think there is an argument to be made that we need more competition in Canada in the airline industry specifically but many others (cell plans are another egregious example). West Jet and Air Canada have carved up the country between them and don't need to give us any kind of service or show their customers any level of decency because we don't have other options.
posted by Ashwagandha at 12:05 PM on October 24, 2023 [1 favorite]

The competition argument would be more plausible if the same thing didn't happen in the U.S. Also, fuck capitalism.
posted by allthinky at 5:43 AM on October 26, 2023

JFC, AIR CANADA!
posted by jacquilynne at 6:42 PM on October 28, 2023 [2 favorites]

JFC AIR CANADA!!!!!

Though this probably answers the question of why they wouldn't even try to help the guy in the last JFC post. They're not trained or capable of doing it in any useful way and will probably make things worse.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:18 AM on November 2, 2023

I doubt anyone is still reading these, but now I'm just adding JFCs to the post for posterity.
posted by jacquilynne at 7:18 AM on November 7, 2023 [2 favorites]

I'm still reading, and saddened and angered each time. JFC!
posted by hydra77 at 8:56 AM on November 7, 2023

Here's an exciting new twist: JFC WestJet. But also Air Canada.
posted by jacquilynne at 5:40 AM on November 8, 2023