Tuesday, August 20, 2013

The final solution to the problem of bawling kids on planes

Warning: This post may offend the sensibilities of mothers of children below 10 years of age. So, proceed cautiously.

I am writing this post during a sleepless night on a flight, the cause of said sleeplessness being a couple of bawling and badly-behaved kids.  Wide awake now, I feel that we must put our heads together to  come up with a final solution to deal with the menace.  

Some of the possibilities that run through my mind, especially when one of the kids is kicking the backside of my seat are: 

1) Airlines could run special planes for kids and their mothers and disallow them from travelling on regular flights. In case this is not found economically viable, special sound-proof enclosures may be provided on each flight and kids can be accommodated there along with their parents.

    2) Small sealed packs containing chloroform should be distributed to parents as they board the flight.  When the captain announces,   “All mobile phones must now be switched off as they interfere with functioning of navigation instruments.  All children must now be anesthetised and put to sleep as they interfere with the sleep of other passengers”, the parents must obey unquestioningly. They will cooperate once they realise they’ll also get a good night’s sleep.

   3) Can someone develop acoustic filters which will selectively suppress the noise of kids? They can continue to bawl and scream, but the sound will get muted. Of course, this solution will not be effective on kids who kick the backside of your seat- in which case, we need to fall back on the chloroform method described above. 

4) How about special containers- like they use for pets- to put the kids into and load them into the cargo section?

5) If none of above works, then the child – with or without the parent- must be parachuted out of the plane.  

    Dark thoughts, I agree. But I need my sleep.  
  
   Update 27/08/13 : Looks like an airline has been reading my blog. (source). Though I don't see why we should be asked to pay more to stay away from wailing babies. Parents of wailing babies must be asked to pay the extra fare. 


 "An airline is offering passengers the option to upgrade to seats in      a quiet zone - where children are banned. Scoot, the budget arm of Singapore Airlines, offers customers the option to fly 'in  peace and quiet', for the cost of £10 (S$18). 
  They promise that if they were to opt in for a ScootinSilence cabin, they would enjoy 'exclusivity and privacy... as under 12s will be someplace else'. 
The low-cost carrier, which flies to Sydney and the Gold Coast rom Singapore, has banned pre-teens from the first seven rows of its economy-class section, allowing passengers can upgrade to the 41-seat ScootinSilence area."







8 comments:

Vaidy said...

Raj, You forgot the obvious - chloroform wipe for any passenger feeling bothered by babies! LOL

ramesh said...

Dear Mr Raj, As a Nazi I am highly offended by your expropriating our patented term.

RD said...

True that! Though, I haven't faced a severe enough experience while flying, to actually think of a probable solution, the thought crosses my head everytime I go to a restaurant to eat, or to the theatres to watch a movie! EVERYTIME!

Cheers,
Rohitesh

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