A flight attendant for a major US airline allegedly scared a family into not using the only child safety harness approved by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for use on airplanes after telling the traumatized parents she would leave their child to die if the plane crashed.
After children reach the tender age of just two years old, they are required to be seated in their own seat during takeoff, landing, and during turbulence, but aviation safety advocates warn that normal airplane seatbelts are too big for small children and can make traveling very uncomfortable.
Some parents get around these issues by traveling with large car seats, but the fact that they are so heavy and cumbersome puts a lot of parents off from traveling with the ‘gold standard’ safety device for very small children.
That’s where the Child Aviation Restraint System or CARES harness comes in. The harness fits to a normal airplane seatbelt, providing a four-point restraint system for children aged two years or more and weighing between 22 and 44 pounds.
Designed and manufactured by the Pheonix-based Amsafe Corporation, which is a world leader in airplane seatbelt and restraint systems, CARES is lightweight, easy to install, and meant to add an extra layer of reassurance for parents who want their children to travel comfortably and safely.
But one flight attendant cast so much doubt in the head of one set of parents using the CARES harness that they were scared into removing it from their child on a recent flight.
Explaining the situation in a Facebook group, the child’s mom wrote: “We’ve taken 20+ flights with my almost 3 year old, and on my last flight home from Disney a few weeks ago, the flight attendant said something to me that I can’t stop thinking about.”
Shortly after installing the CARES harness and securing her daughter, a flight attendant approached her and started a bizarre and worrying conversation.
“The flight attendant saw my daughter and stopped in her tracks,” the woman wrote. After asking to speak bluntly with the mom, the flight attendant allegedly said: “If the plane were to crash and you two (my husband and I) both die, and I can’t figure that out to get her off the plane if she survives, I’ll leave her to die.”
“My jaw dropped,” the mom wrote. “I was like, ‘Oh okay… do you want me to take it off of her? I thought it was safer for turbulence?'”
“Soooooo, now I start spiraling, and I took it off of her because, like?! IDK how a simple chest clip would deter a FA [flight attendant] from taking her out, but that really scared the crap out of me.”
What’s worrying is that US-based carriers and many international airlines have not only known about the CARES harness for years but have also provided specific training and documentation to their flight attendants about it.
The CARES harness is even specifically mentioned on a special FAA website about traveling with children.
Ultimately, however, the CARES harness is designed to be used intuitively, and there is little difference to the four-point restraints used by flight attendants on their jumpseats. In other words, while the CARES harness might not be something that flight attendants see on a day-to-day basis, it is something they should be familiar with.
In fact, flight attendant unions have long advocated for better inflight safety precautions for babies and small children. Especially when it comes to lap infants under two years old who don’t require their own seat.
Unlike many countries, the United States bans the use of extension seatbelts to secure lap infants (the extension belt connects to the adult seatbelt and then around the infant) over fears that it could cause injury in the event of severe turbulence or a sudden stop on the runway.
The Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA) has repeatedly called on the FAA to ban the lap infant policy and instead force parents to book a separate seat for their baby and secure them in an approved car seat.
Lawmakers, however, fear such a move would make flying prohibitively expensive for new parents.
Reminds me of “Coral Safe Sunscreen” requirements on excursion tours for some odd reason.
It’s frustrating how inaccurate a lot of information is about the cares harness. One airline I flew on had a policy that you we’re only allowed to use it in the window seat but the only place that was written down was in the flight attendant manual and in no public facing document. We didn’t have a window seat on that flight so they were telling us we weren’t allowed to use it at all.