

Ryanair CEO: "Seatbelts On Airplanes Are Pointless" - petercooper
http://www.businessinsider.com/ryanair-ceo-seatbelts-on-planes-are-pointless-2012-11?0=transportation-contributor

======
GFischer
I've seen arguments for and against.

Arguments for:

[http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/25/opinion/25iht-
edbibel.1.95...](http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/25/opinion/25iht-
edbibel.1.9503843.html)

"People have broken their necks bouncing off the ceiling when a plane suddenly
drops a few hundred feet in severe turbulence"

[http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1951/are-
safety-...](http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1951/are-safety-belts-
in-planes-meant-for-safety)

"according to the FAA on average 60 people a year are injured a year because
of turbulence.

According to Capt. Lim, each year about 58 U.S. passengers and flight
attendants are injured by not wearing their seat belt."

"Aloha Airlines Flight 243 where a large part of forward portion of the
airplane was ripped from the plane. The only casualty could probably have
survived if she was buckled in at the time."

Arguments against:

"It has been shown that there is no net safety benefit for passengers who
choose to wear 3-point restraints on passenger carrying rail vehicles.
Generally passengers who choose not to wear restraints in a vehicle modified
to accept 3-point restraints receive marginally more severe injuries."

[http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/RSSB_Seatbelts200...](http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/RSSB_Seatbelts2007.pdf)

Plenty of articles about fat people not getting any benefit from airplane
seatbelts.

"in most air crashes, a seat belt will not matter"

[http://www.linkedin.com/answers/business-travel/travel-
tools...](http://www.linkedin.com/answers/business-travel/travel-
tools/BTV_TVT/681502-31139360)

So, basically airplane seat belts are shown to help with turbulence. If an
equivalent level of restraint can be created for standing passengers, I don't
see why not.

Edit: O'Leary seems to be aware of the turbulence issue: "We're not talking
about areas of huge turbulence around Europe."

