
Flight attendant loses job for being less than 1kg overweight - onetimemanytime
https://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/travel-stories/flight-attendant-loses-job-for-being-less-than-1kg-overweight/news-story/ef23db0517c68b905c1998d9045ba372
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poulsbohemian
So converting to imperial - she's 5'2, 136 pounds? That sounds like a very
normal sized woman to me. I can't help but notice that she's been with the
airline for 25 years and wonder if that's the real issue here, especially
given the number of airlines listed in the article of not having similar
weight guidelines. While perhaps this is a field necessitating certainly
height / weight restrictions, this doesn't really sound like an individual
who's a particular outlier in either of those areas.

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tropo
I don't think "very normal" is what we should accept. In an emergency, flight
attendants need strength and speed. They should look like decathlon winners.

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scrollaway
Decathlon winners usually have other jobs. You may have to expand your search,
lest you prefer having no flight attendant at all.

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dekhn
If there's a threshold, it doesn't make sense to make an exception for a
person who is over the threshold, regardless of the amount. because if you did
that, you just redefined the threshold (by induction, we can see this would
permit people with infinite weight...)

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contravariant
This isn't the case. By moving the threshold less and less each time they
could keep moving it indefinitely while remaining below a chosen upper bound.

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dekhn
but that would just converge on the chosen upper bound, which suggests that
upper bound was the threshold.

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contravariant
Well true but you don't have to accept all the people who reach the final
threshold until you've actually raised it all that way, so it allows you to
reject more people while avoiding nasty near misses. It also allows you to
defer the final decision indefinitely, taking into account only those near
misses that actually occur.

For example I reckon you could get it to converge by e.g. accepting anyone who
comes closer to the threshold than anyone before, this could avoid all near
misses (for some definition of 'near miss') while almost certainly remaining
bounded (unproven, ask your local mathematician for advice).

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onetimemanytime
His point is valid though. If the cut off is 100 lbs and allow for 1 lbs more,
then it really is is 101 lbs. Someone weighing 102 would still be fired and so
on.

Maybe older people have more problem keeping weight off (evolution) so this is
also a way to keep them fit _and_ young. I get the BMI thing not being
accurate but then, maybe they don't want "big-boned" or muscular women there.

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asfarley
Recently I was on an airplane where the flight attendant couldn’t walk down
the aisles without jostling the seats on _both sides_. I think a weight
threshold (or possibly a horizontal-span threshold) is reasonable for this
occupation.

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Stevvo
Sometimes it feels like British Airways must have a _minimum_ BMI requirement
for female flight attendants.

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basicplus2
"160cm-tall Ms Hassim, that meant her weight could be no greater than 61kg"

61kg is NOT a healthy weight for this height, BMI is a crock

[https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106268...](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106268439)

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jiofih
Indeed, it’s pretty much overweight.

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mr_toad
Only slightly from a medical standpoint, and a fair way from being obese.

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tropo
Flight attendants should be able to rescue the 99th percentile passengers.

This means carrying the passenger, unconscious or screaming, to the door of
the aircraft and beyond. There may be rough ground or water. The passenger
should be moved to safety, well beyond any fuel slick or fire.

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cafard
The 95th percentile for women is about 260 lb., for men about 285. I am not a
small man, but at my fittest around age 30, I would have had a hell of a time
getting somebody that weight out of an airline seat and out the door as dead
or resisting weight.

