Lap children and Asiana crash

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would never have considered carrying my child on my lap. Ask pilots and flight attendants, and they will always tell you to please buy a seat for your child. Ever been in clear air turbulence? I've seen flight attendants get thrown up and break a limb. What chance does a small child have?

Drive, pay for a seat, or stay home. If you are being relocated for work, your employer will pay for a seat for all members of your family.

When you regularly fly internationally - long haul - it's too expensive. Life is full of risks. That one we're willing to take.

We fly long haul internationally regularly. No way, am I having a lap baby through that -- plus, you still get charged a % of the ticket even for lap babies.

Well, obviously, we have different financial situations!

Or, if you cannot afford a seat for your kid you do not go.

So stupid. If it were so unsafe and immorally bad, airlines and FAA would not allow it. If you disagree, why don't you boycott all airlines for not enforcing safety?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happens once the baby turns 2? Do families magically all of a sudden have the money for an extra seat? Or do you not travel as much anymore because of budget constraints?

When the baby turns two, or more correctly when both of our babies turned two, we stopped flying all together. Too bad, we can't fly to see Grandma in CA any longer, but we can't afford it.

DS has probably flown 10 times with me as a lap baby. Now that he's 3, we don't fly anywhere anymore. We'll travel in December for the holidays, but that's it. Too expensive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I don't understand the logic here. If your family can't afford the very safest mode of transportation (a carseat in a plane) they should go for a far less safe mode (a car) rather than an ever so slightly less safe mode? In other words, if a family is low income then their children's safety doesn't matter?

The second part is equally ridiculous. Lots of people relocate for work in circumstances where there isn't an employer paying for the move.

The reality is, that families juggle priorities for their kids all the time. Safety is a hugely important one, but it's not the only one, and things can have both long term and short term safety ramifications.

I let my daughter play soccer, even though it means driving her there, on potentially unsafe roads, and letting her play a sport with a concussion rate almost as high as football, and exposing her to the sun which can potentially cause skin cancer, when I could simply have her stay home in my basement/tornado shelter watching TV. Why do I do that? Because I believe, in the long term health benefits of being socially connected, and physically active, and because I believe in doing what you love.

Similarly, a family can decide that the best thing, overall, for their child is to know the culture of their origins, and be connected to distant family, or to see the world, or to have parents who earn a decent living and can afford a safe neighborhood with decent schools, and that any of these goals can be facilitated by a plan that includes airplane travel. If airplane travel without a carseat is what's in the budget, then a family might make that choice, and feel confident that they're acting in the best interest of their child.

This. Particularly that last paragraph.

And for all the hysteria on this thread about the danger of being a lap child, it is quite bluntly a theoretical danger. A logical one, to be sure, but in the past 30 years, there have been exactly 3 fatalities due to turbulence and all three were adults. And my husband works for the FAA, so I know of what I speak.

If you're in a plane crash situation, your child could easily be killed in or out of a carseat. I could make a theoretical argument that a child strapped into a car seat might be more likely to die of smoke inhalation in a plane crash, because they're more difficult to get out quickly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would never have considered carrying my child on my lap. Ask pilots and flight attendants, and they will always tell you to please buy a seat for your child. Ever been in clear air turbulence? I've seen flight attendants get thrown up and break a limb. What chance does a small child have?

Drive, pay for a seat, or stay home. If you are being relocated for work, your employer will pay for a seat for all members of your family.

When you are this stupid, you really shouldn't be giving out advice over the internet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I don't understand the logic here. If your family can't afford the very safest mode of transportation (a carseat in a plane) they should go for a far less safe mode (a car) rather than an ever so slightly less safe mode? In other words, if a family is low income then their children's safety doesn't matter?

The second part is equally ridiculous. Lots of people relocate for work in circumstances where there isn't an employer paying for the move.

The reality is, that families juggle priorities for their kids all the time. Safety is a hugely important one, but it's not the only one, and things can have both long term and short term safety ramifications.

I let my daughter play soccer, even though it means driving her there, on potentially unsafe roads, and letting her play a sport with a concussion rate almost as high as football, and exposing her to the sun which can potentially cause skin cancer, when I could simply have her stay home in my basement/tornado shelter watching TV. Why do I do that? Because I believe, in the long term health benefits of being socially connected, and physically active, and because I believe in doing what you love.

Similarly, a family can decide that the best thing, overall, for their child is to know the culture of their origins, and be connected to distant family, or to see the world, or to have parents who earn a decent living and can afford a safe neighborhood with decent schools, and that any of these goals can be facilitated by a plan that includes airplane travel. If airplane travel without a carseat is what's in the budget, then a family might make that choice, and feel confident that they're acting in the best interest of their child.

This. Particularly that last paragraph.

And for all the hysteria on this thread about the danger of being a lap child, it is quite bluntly a theoretical danger. A logical one, to be sure, but in the past 30 years, there have been exactly 3 fatalities due to turbulence and all three were adults. And my husband works for the FAA, so I know of what I speak.

If you're in a plane crash situation, your child could easily be killed in or out of a carseat. I could make a theoretical argument that a child strapped into a car seat might be more likely to die of smoke inhalation in a plane crash, because they're more difficult to get out quickly.

I believe it is actually always the one and same person pushing this agenda. I have seen this topic in various incarnations in several forums and there is always one totally over the top poster, with no understanding whatsoever of relative risks, using the exact same examples.