Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, Happy Saturday. Chuck here delivering a brand new
Speaker 1: Selects episode. But it's really not brand new, because, as
Speaker 1: we all know, these are reruns carefully curated and selected
Speaker 1: by both Josh and I each week. This one comes
Speaker 1: to you from December seventh, twenty seventeen. How Flight Attendants Work.
Speaker 1: Just got back from touring in the Midwest, and I
Speaker 1: went on quite a few flights and made sure I
Speaker 1: gave my appreciation to all the flight attendants because they
Speaker 1: do such great work and I think are often underappreciated.
Speaker 1: So if you want to know what they are actually
Speaker 1: doing on their job and a little bit about how
Speaker 1: you get hired some behind the scenes stuff, check out
Speaker 1: this episode right now, How Flight Attendants Work. Welcome to
Speaker 1: Stuff you should know, A production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3: I'm Josh Clark with me as part of your cabin cruise,
Speaker 3: Charles W. Chuck Bryant filling the whole thing out is
Speaker 3: our pilot Jerry Rowland Captain James as we'll call her
Speaker 3: from now on.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to return your seat, do it's full
Speaker 1: upright position, but along with your trade table.
Speaker 3: If you've lost your device, or phone in the seat,
Speaker 3: don't touch it, just come get one of us. Did
Speaker 3: that happen to you? It's a new thing, what tell me? No,
Speaker 3: it's like a new thing on Delta. And like the
Speaker 3: safety instructions, they actually take a little time to say,
Speaker 3: if you've lost your tablet or phone in your seat,
Speaker 3: don't adjust it, come get a flight attendant.
Speaker 1: What do you mean lost in the seat? What do
Speaker 1: they mean?
Speaker 3: Like if you have if you're sitting there and you
Speaker 3: got the butter fingers, you know, like you turn into
Speaker 3: Jerry Lewis all of a sudden your phone slides down
Speaker 3: into the seat beside you or in between the seat
Speaker 3: next to you. Okay, your phone is in grave danger
Speaker 3: if you adjust your seat back upright again. Oh, like
Speaker 3: I say, get a flight attendant, because they now have
Speaker 3: additional skills in their repertoire to get your tablet or
Speaker 3: phone out safe.
Speaker 1: So at some point a memo went out to these airlines.
Speaker 1: It said, we're breaking cell phones because people are like, well,
Speaker 1: maybe if I just throw my seat up, it'll pop out.
Speaker 3: Sure, it'll shoot right out, like like I pressed rewind
Speaker 3: on life.
Speaker 1: Weird.
Speaker 2: Anyway, this is stuff you should know.
Speaker 1: The uh I thought this was pretty interesting actually, and
Speaker 1: it gave me even more of an appreciation for flight attendants. Yes,
Speaker 1: then I had already gained over my ears.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because if you're one of those puttses who's mean
Speaker 3: to flight attendants you get.
Speaker 1: Off the plane, you're a jerk. Yep.
Speaker 2: Shouldn't be mean to people anyway.
Speaker 3: Like everybody's walking around carrying their own burden that you're
Speaker 3: totally unaware of. And if you're mean to somebody, it
Speaker 3: usually is because you're not getting what you want, right then. Yeah,
Speaker 3: So if everybody can just calm down and be nice
Speaker 3: to each other, that's great. But be extra nice to
Speaker 3: the flight attendants. And if you don't agree with me, now,
Speaker 3: I guarantee you'll agree with us at the end.
Speaker 2: Of the podcast.
Speaker 1: And even in our own article here, there was a
Speaker 1: interview with a flight attendant, a couple of them, a
Speaker 1: couple of them, but one of them, very you know
Speaker 1: of these vets, said, h you know, back in the day,
Speaker 1: everyone was all excited when they flew, they were going
Speaker 1: someplace fun. Now everyone's crabby.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but she makes a really good point. Why.
Speaker 3: She says, it's because this is all post nine to
Speaker 3: eleven that the added layers of security that they've put
Speaker 3: onto getting from your car onto the plane increases stress
Speaker 3: so much that you're exhausted by the time you get
Speaker 3: onto the plane. And if flying has become a chore
Speaker 3: a task, yes, by the seats have gotten way smaller.
Speaker 3: I do buy that the leg room's gotten smaller. And yeah,
Speaker 3: I think that it's just kind of become more of
Speaker 3: like a let's get from point A to point B.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I taking your shoes off, taking your laptop out,
Speaker 1: it's about all the extra security. No big deal, That's
Speaker 1: what I say.
Speaker 3: Did I tell you I've gotten kind of on board
Speaker 3: your train about taking your shoes off on a flight?
Speaker 1: Oh to not do it?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Good, So every once in a while just be like,
Speaker 2: to hell with that.
Speaker 3: I don't care. I'm taking my shoes off. I know
Speaker 3: my feet don't stink, right, But I understand that there's
Speaker 3: people like you out there who are deeply offended by
Speaker 3: that kind of thing, So I typically do leave them
Speaker 3: one unless my dogs are just yeap and so so loud.
Speaker 2: I can't.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I can't ignore it, but it's pretty rare these days.
Speaker 1: I think my deal with that is is you can't
Speaker 1: count on everyone's feet to not stink, right, and I
Speaker 1: think plenty of people are like, I don't care.
Speaker 2: That their feet stink. Yeah, yeah, that's pretty rotten.
Speaker 1: I just want to be comfy.
Speaker 2: That's pretty rotten. But we live in something called society.
Speaker 2: There are rules.
Speaker 1: But getting back to the new regulations, which is pretty
Speaker 1: much laptop out, shoes off. I mean you still had
Speaker 1: to go through the line just like before, you.
Speaker 3: Know, Yeah, it seems it feels different to me. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it does.
Speaker 1: Different as in more time consuming.
Speaker 3: Yeah, much more stressful, Like it's a it's not an
Speaker 3: event like it was. It definitely used to be an
Speaker 3: event in a person's life to go on an airplane.
Speaker 1: Well, do you have a different feeling when you go
Speaker 1: on vacation compared to work.
Speaker 2: Travel as far as the airport goes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and how you feel about it the same, Yeah,
Speaker 1: same stress.
Speaker 3: Yes, a lot, a lot of it, to be fair,
Speaker 3: is in my head. Yeah, to me, pretty much, the
Speaker 3: worst thing that can happen to you is missing your airplane.
Speaker 3: I can't I don't even want to imagine what happens
Speaker 3: when you miss your airplane. Uman's like, it's not that bad.
Speaker 3: As a matter of fact, she's kind of entertained, like
Speaker 3: purposefully making us miss.
Speaker 1: Your own version of cognitivebates.
Speaker 3: But I don't want to miss it, so I generate
Speaker 3: my own stress in a large part. But it does
Speaker 3: seem like much more of a process than it was before. Okay,
Speaker 3: how about you. You're fine with it?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's no big deal, just shoes in
Speaker 1: the laptop. Yeah, two bits.
Speaker 3: But it does seem like and I read this Travel
Speaker 3: and Leisure article about flight attendance where the author was saying,
Speaker 3: I think she was quoting a flight attendant who was saying, like,
Speaker 3: we've all kind of decided as a group that we're
Speaker 3: fine with just getting on an airplane and getting to
Speaker 3: where we're going, and it doesn't have to be this
Speaker 3: luxury experience. And as a result, the price of an
Speaker 3: airline ticket has come down dramatically compared to the golden
Speaker 3: age of flying.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, but then it has gone back up since
Speaker 1: it was pretty cheap.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but relative to say, average income, it's I think,
Speaker 3: much less than it wasn't say, like the sixties, But
Speaker 3: in the sixties they were cutting like cuts of meat
Speaker 3: on a cart in front of you.
Speaker 2: I'm not kidding.
Speaker 3: There was a carving station that they would move. I'm
Speaker 3: not kidding. I've seen us.
Speaker 1: I believe it. I think it's funny that that's the
Speaker 1: definition of fancy is a carving station.
Speaker 2: It really is. I mean it is. The guy had
Speaker 2: the hat and everything.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well you and my extended family agree on that,
Speaker 1: but it's.
Speaker 3: And all of us take our shoes off while we
Speaker 3: eat our carv But there used to be that there
Speaker 3: were like piano lounges in first class lounge like they were.
Speaker 2: It was like it was an event.
Speaker 3: Sure, But the fact that it's gone is because we've
Speaker 3: all said, no, we want we want to be able
Speaker 3: to travel for less cost, right, with fewer frills.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just kind of want to get there. I'm
Speaker 1: with you there, Yeah, if that's what you think, or
Speaker 1: I'm with the airline industry. Yeah, I just hut me
Speaker 1: on the plane and give me there. Maybe throw a
Speaker 1: whiskey down my throat. Sure, and that's about all. There
Speaker 1: you go banana maybe, yeah, if it's the morning.
Speaker 3: But the people who are going to help you get
Speaker 3: there banana and whiskey, Uh yeah, sure, Okay. The people
Speaker 3: who are going to help you get there, they have
Speaker 3: their job has changed over time, but they have not
Speaker 3: because they are unsung heroes and have been from beginning
Speaker 3: to end.
Speaker 1: That's right. The early days of plane travel, they hired
Speaker 1: young men to take care of the stewardship of the plane.
Speaker 3: Cabin boys. Yeah, cabin boy at Chris Elliott movie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that was a boat cabin but still sure,
Speaker 1: still a cabin boy. Yeah. And that was just sort
Speaker 1: of the thing. And then this woman came along and
Speaker 1: you dug this up. This really great. Her name was
Speaker 1: Ellen Church the nineteen thirties, in nineteen thirty in fact,
Speaker 1: and she was a nurse and a licensed pilot, so
Speaker 1: she had it going on. And she said, you know what,
Speaker 1: I have an idea Boeing air Transport, who would become
Speaker 1: United Airlines. Why don't you hire eight women to take
Speaker 1: care of you on your flight for three months and
Speaker 1: just see how that goes. And it went great, and
Speaker 1: they said, I think we're onto something here.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: She actually pitched the idea because at first the execs
Speaker 3: were like, no, it's a stupid idea. This is no
Speaker 3: place for women. Yeah, and she said we'll get this.
Speaker 3: How is a man going to say that he can't
Speaker 3: fly because he's afraid of flying if he knows there's
Speaker 3: a woman up there flying around, and they're like, actually,
Speaker 3: that's pretty good psychology. So they took her up on
Speaker 3: it and it became, yeah, a thing from that moment on.
Speaker 3: But before her I have to say, if we're talking
Speaker 3: gender nonspecific flight attendants, yes, a man had her beat
Speaker 3: by eighteen years a German Man named Heinrich Cubis who
Speaker 3: was the world's first flight attendant and he worked zeppelins,
Speaker 3: including the graf Zeppelin in the Hindenburg.
Speaker 1: Really yeah, did he die on the Hindenburgh? No?
Speaker 2: He lived?
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 3: Very few people died on the Hindenburg. I think they
Speaker 3: were mostly on the ground. Remember, I don't remember, because
Speaker 3: the hydrogen burned up and the people who died were
Speaker 3: ones who jumped.
Speaker 2: That's what it was, is that it. Did we do
Speaker 2: a show on that we've talked about before. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: one of our many, many, many short lived video series.
Speaker 1: Oh right, of course. So at any rate, Ellen Church
Speaker 1: changed the face of the flight attendant industry. And then
Speaker 1: in in the sixties and seventies, of course it was
Speaker 1: sort of a uh and this is not me talking here,
Speaker 1: this is in the article. It was the sexy stewardess
Speaker 1: phase of airline travel. Yeah, and that was definitely the
Speaker 1: deal that you had weight limits and height limits. You
Speaker 1: had to look a certain way and they put you
Speaker 1: in the just the right outfit and it was all
Speaker 1: about sort of, hey, get up there and look good
Speaker 1: and serve drinks.
Speaker 3: So and there were like those limits you talk about. Yeah,
Speaker 3: technically there's still around. There are weight limits and height limits,
Speaker 3: but they're restricted to you can't be so short that
Speaker 3: you can't reach the overhead bins.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're all practical limits.
Speaker 3: Right, you can't be so tall that you're just bumping
Speaker 3: your head all over the place.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: You have to be of the.
Speaker 3: Adequate size to fit into a jump seat that the
Speaker 3: flight attendants sit in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but that's it.
Speaker 3: Back then, it was you have to weigh like, no
Speaker 3: more than one hundred and twenty pounds, you have to
Speaker 3: be this height, and it had everything to do with
Speaker 3: looks and attractiveness.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in your third too, so you're fired.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was a thing like very early on, I
Speaker 3: think in the fifties. I think in the nineteen fifties
Speaker 3: they started airlines started instituting age restrictions where once you
Speaker 3: got to age thirty two, you were no longer eligible
Speaker 3: to be a flight attendant. You might have a job
Speaker 3: down on the ground, but you couldn't be a flight
Speaker 3: attend anymore because you were too old according to them.
Speaker 2: Plus also you couldn't be married.
Speaker 1: Or have kids.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's very restrictive back in the day.
Speaker 3: Also maybe the most sexist industry that's ever existed.
Speaker 1: And of course that's airline dependent. It's not like it
Speaker 1: was a federal regulation. Yeah. Yeah, so it all depended.
Speaker 1: But you need a high school diploma in the very
Speaker 1: least these days. But they're very competitive jobs to get
Speaker 1: you gone to the days where you can just waltz
Speaker 1: in there with a headshot and get a job as
Speaker 1: a flight attendant. A lot of people want these gigs,
Speaker 1: and so if you have a college degree, then you
Speaker 1: definitely have a leg up.
Speaker 3: These definitely, But it's always been pretty competitive. Supposedly, in
Speaker 3: two thousand six, Delta announced that they had one thousand
Speaker 3: openings and got like one hundred thousand applications. But it's
Speaker 3: always been like really competitive because from the beginning it
Speaker 3: was viewed as like really glamorous.
Speaker 1: In the beginning. In the beginning, for sure, I don't
Speaker 1: know from the beginning.
Speaker 2: So because it's been a really competitive career, Chuck.
Speaker 3: And because the airlines were run by like men who
Speaker 3: were decided that they owned their flight attendants because they
Speaker 3: ran the airlines. There was in that sixties, the swinging
Speaker 3: sixties era of that sexy stewardess thing you were talking about,
Speaker 3: like they were a major draw for airlines. Sure, and
Speaker 3: the airlines like advertisements such so I've got found something.
Speaker 3: This is in that Travel and Leisure article I found
Speaker 3: you ready for this?
Speaker 1: I am.
Speaker 3: This is going to knock your socks off. I purposefully
Speaker 3: didn't send this to you because I want you. Yeah. So,
Speaker 3: National Airlines in the sixties had an advertisement where they
Speaker 3: had flight attendants Debbie, Chryl and Karen and they could
Speaker 3: fly me. They also had an alternate slogan, I'm going
Speaker 3: to fly you like you've never been flown before.
Speaker 1: And these are print ads.
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, Continental, well Continentals his name bran If had one.
Speaker 3: Their advertising said does your wife know you're flying with us?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah.
Speaker 3: Pacific Southwest said you want an aisle seat because all
Speaker 3: of our flight attendants have mini skirts and sometimes they
Speaker 3: drop stuff basically and then get this, Eastern Airlines gave
Speaker 3: out little black books to their male passengers so they
Speaker 3: could get the numbers of the stewardesses, the flight attendants.
Speaker 1: And then Quantus had a slogan, ever seen a tick fight?
Speaker 2: Crazy?
Speaker 3: You're right, it's basically the sentiment behind it. And so
Speaker 3: you've got the airline's advertising this, and then the flight
Speaker 3: attendants unions are fighting this stuff tooth and nails, to
Speaker 3: be treated in a dignified manner and not be fired
Speaker 3: because you weigh one hundred and twenty two pounds, right, which, yeah,
Speaker 3: it's just crazy. This is like, this was the way
Speaker 3: that it was back then.
Speaker 1: Yeah, your show up for work and it's like, hey, honey,
Speaker 1: get on the scale, and when's your birthday again? Yeah? Terrible.
Speaker 1: You kind of went to a Bill Clinton. There sounded
Speaker 1: a little Bill Clinton. I thought it sounded like, w
Speaker 1: all right, well, let's let's take a break then and
Speaker 1: work on our presidential accents and we'll come back and
Speaker 1: talk about post nine to eleven flying. All right. So
Speaker 1: we did mention that after nine to eleven, things of
Speaker 1: course did change, and things changed in a big way
Speaker 1: for flight attendants. They not that they never trained on safety,
Speaker 1: but I think the training got way more intense.
Speaker 3: Yeah did you see that one I sent you? Yeah,
Speaker 3: from I think the Points Guy's website.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we should go over that now.
Speaker 2: Actually, so, he.
Speaker 3: Has a flight attendant insider who writes quite a bit
Speaker 3: for his site. I don't remember her name, but just
Speaker 3: look up the Points Guy flight Attendant insider and she
Speaker 3: goes into great detail about what it's like to go
Speaker 3: through training and is more intense than I realized it was,
Speaker 3: for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they and this depends on the airlines, but they
Speaker 1: sort of give averages. The average training is seven weeks,
Speaker 1: but they can be as long as twelve weeks, talking
Speaker 1: six days a week, twelve hours a day. And they
Speaker 1: call it Barbie boot camp because you don't show up
Speaker 1: in your sweats and tank top with no makeup.
Speaker 2: Right, it's not like you're a passenger.
Speaker 1: No, yeah, exactly, you're big fuzzy slippers and your pillow
Speaker 1: from home. Now, you show up as if you are
Speaker 1: there to work a flight. So you have to be
Speaker 1: in whatever attire that they require you to be in
Speaker 1: and have your hair done however you would do it
Speaker 1: and just basically be game day ready, and then they
Speaker 1: work you that many hours a day, because that's about
Speaker 1: how many hours a day you're gonna be working. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when it's a flight attendant.
Speaker 3: When you start working, at first, you have very little
Speaker 3: control over your own schedule, although I get the impression
Speaker 3: you have flexibility out of the gate, But if you
Speaker 3: say I want to work this many days a month,
Speaker 3: that's the input you have at first until you start
Speaker 3: to develop seniority.
Speaker 2: So yeah, they expose you to that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, six days a week, twelve hours a day during training.
Speaker 1: For many weeks. So the first thing they do is
Speaker 1: learn all the safety equipment. They're given written tests that
Speaker 1: she said that they had to score at least a
Speaker 1: ninety on eighty.
Speaker 2: I said, they're really weird, didn't I.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, she said if it was a eighty, they
Speaker 1: had to retake it, So they had to score at
Speaker 1: least a ninety to pass.
Speaker 2: I got you.
Speaker 1: And then practical exams where you had to score one
Speaker 1: hundred percent on these practical tests. And that basically means
Speaker 1: you were on a fake plane doing the thing, and
Speaker 1: it's not like you're serving that diet coke wrong's it's
Speaker 1: mainly ninety percent of this training, ninety five percent in
Speaker 1: this training. Yeah, that's what she said, is equipment safety,
Speaker 1: all that stuff, right.
Speaker 3: Like the first stuff where they're giving these tests that
Speaker 3: you have to score high on is here's all of
Speaker 3: the stuff you need to know about the equipment. And
Speaker 3: then there's the drills where you're showing that you know
Speaker 3: how to use it in these stimulated emergencies.
Speaker 1: Right, you know, like smoke's pouring in a cabin, what
Speaker 1: do you do?
Speaker 2: Did you see that?
Speaker 3: One picture of Emirates Airlines is like the big like
Speaker 3: a third of an Emirates plane basically the main cabin
Speaker 3: with the slide out going into a pool inside like
Speaker 3: a hangar, and you're like, oh, they're going to have
Speaker 3: to go down that slide. There's no way they're not
Speaker 3: going down that slide, and high heels and everything too.
Speaker 3: But they're running these drills and apparently this is a
Speaker 3: big This is where most people wash out, she said,
Speaker 3: was during the drills because it's so stressful. And also
Speaker 3: she points out that because this job always has been
Speaker 3: and still is so competitive, that the airlines can choose
Speaker 3: to be super picky, so they will drop you from
Speaker 3: these training programs pretty easily and quickly because they know
Speaker 3: that they can find somebody else who could do it better.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, so you end up with the cream of
Speaker 1: the crop in the end.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 3: That's a really good way to put And then she
Speaker 3: says that really the last thing they learned and the
Speaker 3: stuff that they spend the least amount of time on
Speaker 3: is the actual customer service stuff like pushing the beverage cart,
Speaker 3: where they know exactly what to do during if sudden
Speaker 3: turbulence hits and there's a beverage cart. They are taught
Speaker 3: less how to pour that diet coke or whatever.
Speaker 1: I think, like, I think I could do that.
Speaker 2: The pouring the stuff. I would get so stressed out.
Speaker 1: The whole thing, Like I've seen it enough now. We
Speaker 1: travel enough for work where if like a flight attendant
Speaker 1: was like, oh my ankle, I could throw on the
Speaker 1: vest and run beverage service.
Speaker 2: You'd be like, step aside, I've got.
Speaker 1: This, Like I know exactly how they're doing it. I'm
Speaker 1: paying attention.
Speaker 3: Would you splint the person's ankle first and then take
Speaker 3: over beverage service?
Speaker 1: I would splint the ankle and then I would get up.
Speaker 1: Do you want peanuts, pretzels or a bisco Off cookie?
Speaker 2: Yep?
Speaker 1: Do what kind of drink.
Speaker 2: You want cancer peanuts anymore?
Speaker 1: And sure you can't.
Speaker 2: The other day, what, yeah, you have peanuts on a flight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think they don't serve peanuts if someone's allergic.
Speaker 1: But I don't think they banned peanuts.
Speaker 2: It was my impression they have just stopped.
Speaker 3: I've been on so many flights and they're like, well,
Speaker 3: we've got peanuts, but you can't have because thirteen E
Speaker 3: is alertic and everybody's like, now they have almonds.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they did have almonds on a Delta plat the
Speaker 1: other day that was on They're delicious.
Speaker 2: So you have peanuts on a flight, that's like a
Speaker 2: Sela canth.
Speaker 1: And then I'm a I'm a sucker for those Delta cookies,
Speaker 1: so are you? I have?
Speaker 3: I have desensitized to them. I actually just do pretzels.
Speaker 3: Now does bisc Off cookies. I used to be a
Speaker 3: junkie for them.
Speaker 1: I like them. Yeah, I mean, you know, it's just
Speaker 1: a little was a cinnamon treat in the air bread
Speaker 1: something or other.
Speaker 3: It's like a gingerbread gingerbread, but it's called speculose, which
Speaker 3: is the worst name for a dessert treat on the plane.
Speaker 1: It says that on the package Speculus.
Speaker 2: It's like, uh, yeah, that's the original Dutch name for that.
Speaker 1: Interesting.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you where the money is, Chuck, where's that?
Speaker 3: I don't remember what airline it is, but they have
Speaker 3: this Dutch treat it's it's too thin, very sweet waffle
Speaker 3: cookies with a caramel like inside.
Speaker 2: Yeah, carmel sandwich.
Speaker 3: And they say, take this thing and put it over
Speaker 3: your hot coffee and let the steam from the coffee
Speaker 3: warm it up. And brother, you were on cloud nine.
Speaker 1: Who tells you that the flight attendant the package?
Speaker 3: Oh okay, the flight attendant doesn't tell you that, right,
Speaker 3: They just go here, read this package.
Speaker 1: That sounds like some fancy international type of line.
Speaker 2: I know it was domestic. I think it was Midwestern though.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of European immigrants from the nineteenth century,
Speaker 3: so that would.
Speaker 1: Exerting their influence. Yea, in all the best foody ways.
Speaker 1: We got side tracked there, where were we?
Speaker 3: Well, we were talking about how difficult the training actually is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's sort of the long and short of it.
Speaker 1: I mean it's long, it's sort of grueling, and at
Speaker 1: the very end is when you learn just that she
Speaker 1: said that you learn that five percent of time you
Speaker 1: spend is what you end up doing ninety nine percent
Speaker 1: of the time, But you just have to be so
Speaker 1: prepared for that one percent. In case something goes wrong,
Speaker 1: you can just react on instinct.
Speaker 3: Well, what's what made me feel really good was that
Speaker 3: she said the flight attendants you were flying with are
Speaker 3: so well trained, and they also have to go back
Speaker 3: for annual training every year to learn like new stuff
Speaker 3: that the airlines have figured out, learn new procedures, whatever.
Speaker 2: And you know, anytime, say, like an airline.
Speaker 3: Deploys a new jet in its fleet, they got to
Speaker 3: go figure that out because the safety stuff's in different
Speaker 3: places and they need to know this stuff and they
Speaker 3: need to be able to remember it and act on
Speaker 3: it during an emergency. So I guess I didn't really
Speaker 3: realize this, but any flight attendant on a commercial aircraft
Speaker 3: that you're flying is capable of saving your life should
Speaker 3: an emergency arise.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean they talk about they even go through
Speaker 1: like a baby birth in training, right.
Speaker 3: So the next time you want to yell at them
Speaker 3: because they're saying the overhead space is full, remember that
Speaker 3: that person can save your life if this plane starts
Speaker 3: to go down.
Speaker 2: Or lands in the water or something.
Speaker 1: And it's not their fault. The over head space is full.
Speaker 3: It's it's all the people who put their bag up
Speaker 3: and then walk to the back of the plane.
Speaker 1: Are you talking about the worst people on earth?
Speaker 3: The worst people? And they took their shoes off as
Speaker 3: they were walking back.
Speaker 1: Oh man, why did people do that?
Speaker 3: I don't know, but I was on a flight the
Speaker 3: other day and I've never seen overhead space more screwed
Speaker 3: up by just a handful of people who did back.
Speaker 3: It was crazy, Like toward the end, people who were
Speaker 3: sitting in like the first you know, five rows after
Speaker 3: first class, we're having to go to the back of
Speaker 3: the plane and you're just like watching them like, oh man,
Speaker 3: you poor person as you're as you're walking off the
Speaker 3: plane and they're just sitting there waiting to get their bag.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think when they started charging for bags, that's
Speaker 1: when everything went berserk because nobody wants to check their
Speaker 1: bag except me. I don't mind.
Speaker 2: Now that's crazy to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've never lost a bag, so I don't mind.
Speaker 1: I don't have to sweat it. I mean, this is
Speaker 1: a if I'm just going on a work trip. I
Speaker 1: don't even have my roller bag anymore, and I will
Speaker 1: buzzmarkt them all day. My red Ox oh really yeah,
Speaker 1: my red Ox shoulder bag.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Uh, the thing is great and I can fit everything
Speaker 1: in there. But if I'm going on like a vacation,
Speaker 1: and I know you think it's heresy, but I will
Speaker 1: check that bag and relax, Hey, my day away.
Speaker 2: I'm not trying to yuck your yom here.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: If you want to check your bag, that's fine.
Speaker 1: Or gate check it. That's the good deal because you
Speaker 1: don't have to pay there.
Speaker 3: Okay, I have no problem with gate checking it at
Speaker 3: the plane, so it's just stowed in a handy manner,
Speaker 3: so you just walk off and they hand it to you.
Speaker 2: That's fine.
Speaker 3: But there are very few things that you can do
Speaker 3: that is a bigger waste of time than standing around
Speaker 3: waiting for your bag to make.
Speaker 2: It to the bag carousel.
Speaker 3: I hate doing that, especially when you're ready for vacation
Speaker 3: to start.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't mind because most airports, my bag's cruising
Speaker 1: around that thing by the time I get to baggage.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah for me, okay, and that's just because
Speaker 1: I U I don't know. I don't like having to
Speaker 1: mess with fighting a bag a suitcase on a plane.
Speaker 1: I don't like contributing to that whole process, much less
Speaker 1: being a business traveler. Like you see those dudes that
Speaker 1: have the the roller bag with the big bag on
Speaker 1: top of that and then a backpack. You're like, dude,
Speaker 1: that's like you, that's three pieces of luggage.
Speaker 2: You need to merge them, all right.
Speaker 1: But this is not about just us complaining about traveling.
Speaker 2: Get back to the flight attendants, get back to us.
Speaker 1: So customer service. It is the goal of the flight
Speaker 1: in it to keep you happy as possible. But also
Speaker 1: you know they don't have to indulge you once you
Speaker 1: have passed the point of sobriety or just jerkness. They
Speaker 1: don't deal with that stuff anymore. Like they will stop
Speaker 1: boarding the plane if you were drunk before you get
Speaker 1: on and have you escorted off. It's it's serious business.
Speaker 1: Now you shouldn't get on a plane if you're loaded.
Speaker 2: No time was they would get you loaded on the plane.
Speaker 2: Now they yeah, they do. They don't mess with that.
Speaker 1: But they are long days, so like we said, twelve
Speaker 1: hour days. They are if you're if you're new, like
Speaker 1: you said, earlier. They don't have a ton of control
Speaker 1: over their schedule. So you're gonna be working a lot
Speaker 1: of weekends. Everybody's gonna be working some weekends. You're gonna
Speaker 1: be doing overnight trips, spending the night in cities, and
Speaker 1: that can sometimes be fun if you put a positive
Speaker 1: spin on.
Speaker 2: It, sure, or it can be a big drag.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: But one thing that I had seen across the board
Speaker 3: from all the sources I hit for this was that
Speaker 3: you it's up to you how much or how little
Speaker 3: you fly up to I think one hundred hours a month,
Speaker 3: there's like a maximum you can you can work.
Speaker 1: Right, They probably minimums, do, don't you think?
Speaker 3: Or no, not that I saw. I'm probably menial to
Speaker 3: get perks, because probably do. Yeah, But I get the
Speaker 3: impression that that's actually once you've done it for like
Speaker 3: six months. Typically when you're hired on for an airline,
Speaker 3: you're on a probationary six month period on the perks. Yeah,
Speaker 3: because they don't want just you know, everyone, They don't
Speaker 3: know you from anybody, they've known you for seven weeks,
Speaker 3: they just trained.
Speaker 1: You, right, you I want ten buddy passes and then
Speaker 1: I'm going to quit my job.
Speaker 2: Exactly. Well, I saw another thing too.
Speaker 3: Apparently buddy passes are like the worst thing that's ever
Speaker 3: happened to a flight attendant. Yeah, because everybody begs for him.
Speaker 3: But they are like really actually bad passes. Like you're
Speaker 3: at the end of standby and if your friend, if
Speaker 3: you give the buddy pass to your friend and they
Speaker 3: start yelling at the gate agent, you get in trouble
Speaker 3: because it was your buddy pass that was being used.
Speaker 3: You might even have your perks revoked because your friend
Speaker 3: was a jerk to the gate attendant and everybody's always
Speaker 3: asking you for him. So a lot of people just
Speaker 3: don't even touch the buddy pass perk.
Speaker 1: That's like, if you're a country club member, you're responsible
Speaker 1: for the behavior of your guests right now, not that
Speaker 1: I would know.
Speaker 3: There are other perks, you know, know you've seen Caddyshack.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I've never like belonged to the country club.
Speaker 3: There are other perks where like family members, immediate family members,
Speaker 3: sometimes extended family members, spouses, they get the same perks
Speaker 3: you do, which very frequently is like you just pay
Speaker 3: taxes on the tight and you fly for free. That's different,
Speaker 3: Like all flight attendants take advantage of that, some of
Speaker 3: them will will hop on over to Europe or something
Speaker 3: for you know.
Speaker 1: Lunch one hundred bucks.
Speaker 2: Yeah maybe if that in tax. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, buddy passes used to be a lot easier when
Speaker 1: they didn't over sell all the flights. You know, Like
Speaker 1: I used to have friends back in the day. I'd
Speaker 1: get a buddy pass fly no problem, right, But now
Speaker 1: you're right, you're in a bad position.
Speaker 2: Yeah you are.
Speaker 3: Do you remember flights where like entire rows would be empty.
Speaker 3: They'd be like, well, the flight was scheduled, so we
Speaker 3: have to we have to stick to it.
Speaker 2: It's it's strange, what a day.
Speaker 1: So you're gonna be working seventy five to eighty five
Speaker 1: hours a month generally, but like you said, I guess
Speaker 1: you can't go over that one hundred mark. And interestingly, too,
Speaker 1: another thing you get trained for is very sadly human trafficking.
Speaker 1: These days, they will fly kidnapped people right in front
Speaker 1: of people's faces, and so flight attendants now are trained
Speaker 1: to spot this kind of activity, which can mean like
Speaker 1: an adult who doesn't really understand about the final destination,
Speaker 1: that's a bad sign. Yeah, Or if it's like an
Speaker 1: adult traveler with a minor and they just it definitely
Speaker 1: looks like a little more than parental behavior going on,
Speaker 1: like don't get up and go to the bathroom and
Speaker 1: that kind of thing.
Speaker 2: Apparently that's how it started.
Speaker 3: There was a man who caught the suspicion of a
Speaker 3: flight attendant named Sandra Fiorini. She worked for American Airlines.
Speaker 3: She noticed that like a late eighteen year old teenager
Speaker 3: age guy who was had an infant that still had
Speaker 3: the umbilical cord attached, and like a bottle of milk
Speaker 3: in his pocket, a couple of diaper stucks his in
Speaker 3: his pocket his other pocket, so like this baby was
Speaker 3: stolen or bought or something. And she started looking into
Speaker 3: it and found out that there was actually a big
Speaker 3: deal and teamed up with a woman named Deborah Sigmund
Speaker 3: who founded Innocence at Risk, and they kind of started
Speaker 3: this program where now, if you're a flight attendant, when
Speaker 3: the things you're trained for is to recognize human trafficking,
Speaker 3: and they actually a bunch of flight attendants volunteered at
Speaker 3: the last Super Bowl to look for human trafficking because
Speaker 3: apparently the Super Bowl is like also the super Bowl
Speaker 3: of prostitution and human trafficking in the world every year.
Speaker 3: So flight attendants went to the Super Bowl and volunteered
Speaker 3: to kind of like keep tabs on things and call
Speaker 3: out people they thought.
Speaker 1: Were amazing traffic.
Speaker 3: Yeah, somebody wrote in and said, you can call it
Speaker 3: super Bowl.
Speaker 1: It can't do anything, can't like advertise anything using those words. Right,
Speaker 1: I don't think.
Speaker 3: We can't sell our Super Bowl bobble heads that we
Speaker 3: have a box full of.
Speaker 2: Too bad, it was a poor investment.
Speaker 1: Should we take our final break here? Yeah, all right,
Speaker 1: let's do that. We'll talk a little bit more about
Speaker 1: some of the perks and drawbacks right after this. All right,
Speaker 1: let's talk about pay baby, you don't make a ton
Speaker 1: of money. I think starting salaries in the mid thirties.
Speaker 1: Oh no, I know for a flight attendant.
Speaker 2: That's no.
Speaker 3: No, starting salary can be like eighteen oh really the
Speaker 3: median And in twenty twelve or thirteen or fourteen was
Speaker 3: thirty seven the median. Yeah, that's like that's the middle.
Speaker 3: That's not much, you know. That's why it's such an
Speaker 3: attractive a job for people who are just looking for
Speaker 3: extra money. Right, if you're a parent and you have
Speaker 3: so much control over your schedule, once you start to
Speaker 3: get some seniority.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a great, great way to spend your money.
Speaker 3: If you're a soap opera star, it's a great, great
Speaker 3: extra job. Did you see that?
Speaker 1: Yeah? What was her name?
Speaker 2: Kate Linder who plays Esther Valentine on The Young and
Speaker 2: the Restless.
Speaker 1: Who knew she's a flight attendant as well.
Speaker 3: For like thirty two years. Yeah, and she's done them
Speaker 3: both for about the same amount of time. Yeah, and
Speaker 3: she does it like every week.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and she says it helps keep her grounded no
Speaker 1: pun intended.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she didn't say the no pun intended part.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But I mean she gets those perks, she gets
Speaker 1: to fly to Europe for lunch if she wants, right,
Speaker 1: and act on soaps.
Speaker 2: Right, So good for her. And that's not to say
Speaker 2: that that median.
Speaker 3: I mean, obviously that's the middle amount, but it goes
Speaker 3: much higher than that. And it all has to do
Speaker 3: all perks, all pay all benefits, all that stuff. The
Speaker 3: flight attendant profession is all about seniority.
Speaker 1: Oh sure.
Speaker 3: And there are plenty of flight attendants out there who
Speaker 3: are career flight attendants and you know, like Kate, Kate Linder,
Speaker 3: she's been doing it for thirty two years. There's another
Speaker 3: woman named Candy Bruton who is a forty three year
Speaker 3: veteran of flight attendant. Yeah, like you can make a long,
Speaker 3: happy career out of it now that they've taken that
Speaker 3: age restriction off.
Speaker 1: Yeah, twenty one dollars and twenty three cents. A few
Speaker 1: years ago an hour was the rate for a first
Speaker 1: year attendant. So plus twenty dollars an hour. But here's
Speaker 1: the thing, and this is something that I bet ninety
Speaker 1: five percent of human beings don't realize. When you were
Speaker 1: sitting on that plane and those doors are open and
Speaker 1: they're getting you your first class drinks, or they're helping
Speaker 1: you put your bags away and you're complaining because you
Speaker 1: don't have a pillow and coach. They're doing that for
Speaker 1: almost free, because the only hours that they get paid
Speaker 1: for at that rate are flight hours.
Speaker 3: Yeah, when it says the boarding doors now closed, the
Speaker 3: clock just started for them.
Speaker 1: Never knew that.
Speaker 2: No, I didn't either.
Speaker 3: They get something like, depending on the airline, maybe a
Speaker 3: dollar fifty to or dollars ninety five an hour for
Speaker 3: the pre the boarding stuff. The pre while the door's
Speaker 3: open stuff, I guess is what you call it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So like, next time you're sitting on the tarmac
Speaker 1: and you're delayed for two hours and you're super grumpy,
Speaker 1: think about that flight attendant who is getting paid almost
Speaker 1: nothing to be dealing with how grumpy you are.
Speaker 2: If the boarding doors closed, they would be getting paid, right.
Speaker 1: No, they set in here if flight delays, they like,
Speaker 1: flight time is the only thing that matters.
Speaker 2: I thought it was once the door.
Speaker 3: So if the door's closed and you go out to
Speaker 3: the runway and you're just sitting there on the runway,
Speaker 3: they would be getting paid.
Speaker 1: I thought that's not what it said. Somebody let us know,
Speaker 1: because it said in the article. If next time you're
Speaker 1: on a big flight delay, think about the fact that
Speaker 1: they're not making any money.
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 1: And that's probably why the airline put it in there,
Speaker 1: because can you imagine how much money they would have
Speaker 1: to pay in flight attendants for flight delays.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it's not like the flight attendants are just like,
Speaker 3: I'm off the clock, don't bother me.
Speaker 2: Once we get into the air, you can bother me.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: You don't hear that, you know, so they should be
Speaker 2: paying them for that.
Speaker 3: Hey, I agree, you know, I think we should paying
Speaker 3: together in start a social movement here.
Speaker 1: I wonder why you should tip flight attendants too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not a thing.
Speaker 1: They should stand you know, the end, when they stand
Speaker 1: there and say good day and I hope you enjoyed
Speaker 1: your flight, they should be holding the jar as far
Speaker 1: as I'm concerned, it's just shaking it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, throw five bucks in there on your way out,
Speaker 2: bye bye.
Speaker 1: I think they'd be great.
Speaker 3: You remember Tina Mucklough, the dB Cooper heist. Yeah, he
Speaker 3: tried to give her ten twenty thousand dollars and she
Speaker 3: said no, tipping aloud.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 2: What a hero.
Speaker 1: And quite often flight attendants are the heroes on many flights,
Speaker 1: whether it is dealing with literally a terrorist and trying
Speaker 1: to manage that situation bravely, or God forbid, some sort
Speaker 1: of incident in the air with you know, like with
Speaker 1: the plane itself. But at the very least, those jerks
Speaker 1: on planes that think they can just talk to people
Speaker 1: however they want, they got to put up with a
Speaker 1: lot in a very cramped space.
Speaker 3: Very early on in flight attendant history. I don't know
Speaker 3: if we said or not. You said that Ellen Church
Speaker 3: was a registered nurse, but that was par for the course.
Speaker 3: For early flight attendants, they had to be registered nurses.
Speaker 1: Makes sense.
Speaker 3: There was one named Nellie Granger who was a TWA
Speaker 3: flight attendant and she was on a flight going to Pittsburgh,
Speaker 3: I believe in nineteen thirty six, and it crashed and
Speaker 3: she pulled a couple of passengers to.
Speaker 2: Safety and.
Speaker 3: It down the mountain to get help and went back
Speaker 3: up with the rescuers to help minister to the two
Speaker 3: injured passengers whose lives she saved.
Speaker 1: And you got thirty cents an hour.
Speaker 3: She got a trip to the with her aunt. That's
Speaker 3: nice by TWA. Yeah, I got a couple more things. Sure,
Speaker 3: there's some crazy stuff that flight attendants have seen. The
Speaker 3: one that gets me though, is dead bodies on planes
Speaker 3: that are purposefully brought onto planes, not people who die. Apparently,
Speaker 3: Singapore Airlines has what's called a corpse closet on their
Speaker 3: planes to stow a passenger who might die mid air.
Speaker 1: That's nice.
Speaker 3: They're in the minority there that I think there might
Speaker 3: be peculiar with that. But sometimes because shipping a body
Speaker 3: is very expensive, it can run into the thousands and
Speaker 3: thousands of dollars. Some people say, well, it'd be cheaper
Speaker 3: if I just bought a plane ticket or put my
Speaker 3: mother in a garment bag and just smuggle her body
Speaker 3: on board and took her where she's going to be
Speaker 3: buried myself. Yeah, that a guy got caught doing that Miami.
Speaker 3: There was in this Mental Floss article. There was the
Speaker 3: person who was interviewed said her roommate found a mother
Speaker 3: and a daughter trying to smuggle the dead father onto
Speaker 3: a flight. Yeah, just in a wheelchair, and said that
Speaker 3: he had the flu, but he was clearly dead and
Speaker 3: they had to stop the plane mid flight.
Speaker 1: Wow, maybe he did have the flu.
Speaker 2: No, he was dead.
Speaker 1: No, I mean maybe that's how I died.
Speaker 3: Oh, maybe he previously had the flu. Yeah, it could
Speaker 3: have been. Like there's a kernel of truth to what
Speaker 3: we just said.
Speaker 2: That's it.
Speaker 3: Oh, and don't order to diet coke because apparently it
Speaker 3: takes the longest to stop fizzing on a trolley.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's science.
Speaker 3: If you want to know more about flight attendants, just
Speaker 3: chat up a flight attendant. I'm sure they'd love to
Speaker 3: tell you some great stories. And in the meantime, it's
Speaker 3: time for listener.
Speaker 1: Now, I'm gonna call this PSA about the flu because
Speaker 1: we had someone Courtney Harmouth who was Askani who says this, Hey, guys,
Speaker 1: want to basically give you a PSA about how dangerous
Speaker 1: the flu can be. In twenty twelve, it was a
Speaker 1: healthy high school freshman was suddenly stricken with a horrible
Speaker 1: digestive distress, chills, fever, coughing. After a week or so,
Speaker 1: my parents took me to the GP and I was
Speaker 1: told to go to the hospital for observation and get
Speaker 1: an IV. What was supposed to be one night turned
Speaker 1: into a month. I'd contracted the swine flu.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: That first night my vitals went crazy and I ended
Speaker 1: up having to be kept in my local hospital for
Speaker 1: two weeks. During my say, I developed pneumonia as a complication.
Speaker 1: Soon after that, fluid began to fill my lungs and
Speaker 1: I had to be helicopter to a larger hospital in Madison.
Speaker 1: She said being in the helicopter was.
Speaker 2: Pretty sweet though, oh really.
Speaker 1: Yeah, even though you know she was being.
Speaker 2: Sick and a helicopter would not be comfortable.
Speaker 1: I think she's a bright side person.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: For about twenty minutes, I was only taking in about
Speaker 1: thirty percent and oxygen. My parents were told I could
Speaker 1: have brain damage or may even die. On my arrival
Speaker 1: to the larger hospital, I was immediately put to a
Speaker 1: medically induced coma for eleven days. Oh my god, I
Speaker 1: was finally taken out of my coma. I had atrophied
Speaker 1: and weigh of measly ninety five pounds at twelve years old.
Speaker 1: I had to relearn how to walk, write, and use
Speaker 1: basic motor skills. I am extremely lucky. I am completely
Speaker 1: recovered from the ordeal, did not suffer any long term
Speaker 1: health effects, and now at twenty three years old, I
Speaker 1: thankfully not had the flu. Sense I tell this to
Speaker 1: everyone to say, please get vaccinated against the flu. The
Speaker 1: flu vaccine doesn't just protect you, but also your kids, parents, friends,
Speaker 1: and co workers. Really love your show. I want to
Speaker 1: thank you for doing such a great job about important
Speaker 1: and sometimes hilarious topics. That is our Wisconsinate fan, Courtney Harmouth, Thanks.
Speaker 2: A lot, Cordney. Glad you made it through that one.
Speaker 2: That was a pretty scary.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we said the flu could be dangerous, so you
Speaker 1: have it.
Speaker 2: Cordney just proved it.
Speaker 1: Everybody.
Speaker 3: If you want to tell us a great story that
Speaker 3: is harrowing and amazing, we want to hear it, or
Speaker 3: if you have a good flight attendant story that's a
Speaker 3: good one too.
Speaker 2: You can send us an email.
Speaker 3: The Stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.