A photo of a baffling plane seat has gone viral on Facebook, with the person sharing it questioning why it has been labelled with a hand-stitched warning: “DO NOT OCCUPY THIS SEAT.”
Taking to the Dull Mens Club Facebook group, Sven Wöste wrote: “I was sitting in the last aisle of a Croatia Airlines plane on the window seat (31F). The seat next to me was free and had a notice stitched in the cushion that this seat has to stay unoccupied. The flight attendance said it is because there is no seatbelt. Made no sense for me because the mounting for the belt was there. Should have been easier to fix a seatbelt than do that stitching work.”
You can see an example of a similar “forbidden seat” in this tweet:
The mystery had a lot of people scratching their heads. Around a thousand people replied to Sven in the comments, sparking a lively debate.
One person suggested: “I’ve been in aircraft maintenance for 15 years, there’s many reasons that the seat could need to be empty but most like reason is the seat is just broken. Could be an arm rest or the recline isn’t working. Either way their procedure is to mark the seat and possibly remove the seat belt.”
Someone else came up with another idea: “Maybe it has been saved for a child with a car seat because it could attach to the belt mounts?”
A third simply joked: “That’s the ejector seat.”
The most morbid suggestion was definitely this one: “Every aircraft must have a seat to put someone if they pass away. Do not want them cluttering up first class so they move them to the back if the aircraft. At least you will not have to worry about them snoring.”
However, some eagle-eyed aviation fans signposted Sven to an article written in August 2024 on the Avioradar website, which explains the reason behind the “phantom seat.” Spoiler alert: its because of maximum passenger numbers.
Avioradar explain: “The reason, again, ties back to safety regulations concerning evacuation procedures. As confirmed by Airbus to AvioRadar, if the 150th seat were to be occupied, the aircraft would need two additional over-wing exits, bringing the total to four. Such a modification would raise questions about its financial feasibility for the airline.”
Not the most exciting explanation, perhaps, but at least Sven had his curiosity satisfied in the end. And as many commenters said, if you end up sitting next to this “forbidden” seat just sit back, relax and enjoy the fact you won’t be fighting with anyone else for the use of the arm rest.
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