Flight Attendant Union President Says Airplane Seats are ‘Torture Chamber’

A flight attendants union president said during a meeting with congress Wednesday that cramped seating on planes can be “torture.”

According to CNN.com, Association of Professional Flight Attendants (AFPA) president Lori Bassani spoke during a House Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee congressional hearing about the strains placed on passengers due to the shrinking aircraft seat sizes.

“We find that the seats are not only getting smaller, but there’s no padding on them anymore. It is a torture chamber for our customers and for us, that also fly on our own airlines,” Bassani told congress.

“People are having a hard enough time… getting in and out in a normal process, but in an evacuation, it’s going to be almost impossible,” Bassani continued.

Bassani went on to claim during the “State of Aviation Safety” hearing that current regulations regarding seat pitch do not allow passengers to assume the recommended brace position in the event of an emergency.

The hope of Bassani’s subcommittee hearing testimony is to force the Federal Aviation Administration to conduct “overdue” reviews of current standards and evacuation procedures for the current fleets of aircraft.

“The truth is that many passengers are older, larger, and in many cases have less mobility,” Bassani said. “Passengers look to us for reassurance in these difficult times. Along with our flight deck, we want to know and be able to communicate to the traveling public that we have, and will continue to have, the safest aviation system in the world.”