While airlines continue to disagree on how to handle the first returns to 'normal' operations, with some arguing for not selling the middle seat and others pushing pre-flight health screening, the fact remains that we may be on the edge of a very different era in flying.
What they all agree on, reading across industry and consumer publications, is that recovery will not be swift—Delta chief Ed Bastian is predicting three years—and that passenger health and some form of social distancing will remain for quite a while.
Some guesses at what might be needed are showing up in concept sketches from the companies that design and build aircraft seats. One major supplier, Italy's Aviointeriors is showing airlines several possible solutions, including the so-called Janus seat above, named for the two-faced Roman god. That design not only provides more distance and even privacy, it puts an end to the endless struggle over who the armrest belongs to. A less radical version keeps traditional seating, but adds what amounts to a sneeze hood.
But for many in the industry, there is a recognition that in the long run no amount of seat tinkering, or even not selling middle seats, will create real social distance in flight.
Some, like Alexandre de Juniac, CEO of the airline-industry group IATA, think it might not be necessary. He has suggested that “if you provide masks and gloves, knowing that the air is filtered, there’s a big question mark;” real social distancing might not be needed on planes.
The airlines would like that to be true, because the alternative is flying half empty to keep space available. In De Juniac's view, there's "not an airline in the world" that could survive that way—except by doubling prices to make up the difference, and that could not only mean the end of cheap travel, it would mean a huge drop in demand, which could not only kill numbers of airlines but severely depress the tourism industry in destination countries.
In De Juniac's view, in fact, that would possibly mean the end of 'economy' as we know it: "It means two things: either you fly at the same price, selling the ticket at the same average price as before and then you lose an enormous amount of money, so it's impossible to fly for any airline. Or you increase the ticket price for a similar product by at least 50 per cent and then you are able to fly with a minimum profit."
One way or the other, the airlines are clearly thinking hard and planning for various scenarios; for some, the pressure has already become too great, with both Virgins, Australia and Atlantic, sinking into bankruptcy already with others possibly poised to follow, either now or after lockdown.
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