Why weigh the passenger?

“Of course I felt bad. I felt embarrassed that the madlang public had to see my weight…. I hate them… Anyway, I still feel I am sexy!”

Those are excerpts of an email I received from a dear “sexy” friend. She was lamenting, well uh, complaining why the airline had to weigh her, yes her very “sexy” body, aside from her luggage. I already answered her email. But, this same story she repeated when we met at another friend’s party – with all the action and facial expressions – we could all have died laughing at her animated story-telling! While we ate… and I could see fried chicken, lechon, caldereta, pancit and leche flan on her big plate, among others!

Well, I repeated what I told her in the mail, and let me tell you about it here…

Why weigh a passenger?
Technically, all things that go into an aircraft should be weighed. Why? Because the nearest to accurate weight of the plane is needed by airline staff and the pilot to calculate things (its complicated but I will tell you about those in a later story) so that the craft would be able to fly safely (first), comfortably (second) and economically (third) – in that order. I said “nearest to accurate” since many things are presumed, assumed or estimated for convenience.

Now let me ask… “would you like to fly in an airplane where everything is just estimated”? Kahaladlok ah, di ba la?!

Yeah yeah, you will readily counter that it does not happen in most airlines you have flown. That’s true, since in this country and most everywhere, most of the airliners’ planes are big jet-planes that can tolerate more of the “estimating” than smaller propeller aircraft. Note: the smaller the plane, the more there is a need to weigh everything – including passengers.

In the case of my dear friend, she was flying from Cebu to Iloilo and the airline uses a small aircraft. Yes, propeller aircraft (where you see the big electric fans on the side). So she, just like all other passengers taking that flight, must be weighed together with her handcarried baggage, aside from her checked luggage.

If that happens, don’t be offended… just say “thank you” for that means the airline is doing its job to ensure safety. And yes, after that… learn to stick to your new year’s resolution (for the 7th year now) that you’ll continue that weight-loss exercise program UNTIL you actually loose weight. Its not an overnight program, y’know! And by the way, don’t hate the airline’s check-in agents, they really need to do that. Plus, they may have a privacy policy but if you are worth talking about, there’s no assurance they won’t tell at least a friend or two that you are exactly 87.9 kilograms which is rounded to 88 kilograms. Be thankful still that they don’t measure passenger heights whahehehe! Peace ‘woman’, peace gid ya ah!

Remember dear sexy ladies, most airlines estimate a Filipino Female Passenger at 65 kilograms for that is already considered the ‘average maximum’!

Happy eating (oops, flying) in 2012 and beyond!