A tiny bit of progress on in-flight wheelchairs
Passengers with disabilities have had to transfer from their mobility devices into regular airline seats since forever. The The Air Carrier Access Act (49 U.S.C. § 41705) prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in air travel, but somehow it doesn't limit airlines' ability to damage or destroy passengers' mobility devices, which they do thousands of times every year.
@haez93 Dang, after i saw them do this and laugh with the first two wheelchairs i had to get it on film. That is not what id call “handling with care” for someones mobility device…. #AmericanAirlines #handlewithcare #mobilitydevice #wheelchair
♬ Oh No - Kreepa
A wheelchair rolls down a cargo chute and somersaults onto the tarmac.
(My favorite thing about this video is at the very end, when the baggage handler picks up the chair by its wheels and it rotates upside down. It looks like he does it deliberately, so he can stack the chair on top of others on the baggage cart.)
In several decades of occasional flying, I've had my wheelchairs damaged twice. Neither incident was serious enough to make the chairs unusable, the airlines involved paid for the repairs without complaint, and both times I was fortunate that the damage occurred on the return leg of the trip, so my travel plans weren't affected. I'm all too aware of how bad it could have been, though, so I'm happy to see the industry taking baby steps toward allowing passengers to remain in their mobility devices during flights.
According to DOT spokesperson Sean Manning, “At the direction of Secretary Buttigieg, the FAA has been conducting and supporting research on installing wheelchair restraint systems in the aircraft cabin to enable passengers to fly in their own wheelchair. Currently, the FAA has not identified any major issues to installation, and mitigations for any minor issues are being developed. We are pleased to share that the FAA expects to determine the feasibility of wheelchairs on aircraft by the end of 2025.”
So if I understand this correctly, the FAA will decide a year from now whether or not to move forward on approving standards to allow passengers to remain in their wheelchairs on planes. OK, deep breath. Another.
I'm guessing that Mayor Pete's 2028 presidential campaign operation hit the ground running on November 6th.
It'll be fun to bird-dog him on this issue next time he visits New Hampshire.