Air Hostesses: Too Fat to Fly

That's freakin ridiculous. I hope they sue the pants right off that airline.
Anyway, if my plane was being hijacked, I'd rather have a physically strong, mentally competent flight attendant than one they picked because she looks like a supermodel.

I'm sure a staff of waif-like flight attendants will have no problem restraining a rowdy passengy.

Or maybe they're following the idea posted previously, where the less a person weighs, the more gas they save.

They're only trying to save on jet fuel, people.

This is b.s., and the attendant interviewed called it: they want youth.

They need to hire men only if terrorism is truly their concern. Although it's true that weight and balance are very important in flying (I'm a Pilot)the small difference between a fat and thin attendant is probably insignificant. They need to be honest!

Wow..At first I thought that it may be an issue squeezing up and down the centre aisle all the time... I could see that being an issue but 64K instead of 63!!! That is laughable no?

"Wow..At first I thought that it may be an issue squeezing up and down the centre aisle all the time"

That was my first thought too. Actually, my only thought about why this would ever happen. I really don't care if my flight attendant is overweight, just as long as she's nice. I've had a few flights where my attendant was young/pretty/thin, but still a b*tch.

The particular cut-off point is certainly open to honest debate, and may be too low (without height data, it's hard to judge), but on the other hand, I wouldn't want the typical Wal-Mart cashier to be my flight attendant. There needs to be some sort of limit. And in defense of the airline, they gave the flight attendants almost a year's notice, the cut-offs are not at all "model skinny," and the rules were in place for years before they gave notice that they would start to enforce them if the employees continued to ignore them.

This is a joke right? Boy I tell you, we're about an inch away from putting fat people on a island all together....what's going to be the next problem with being fat!!?? Somebody needs to put a stop to this discrimination!

This is what happens when society focusses on a frickin number!

WOW! 1.9 kilo difference! That is amazingly irrelevant!

It would have no baring on how she performs her job!

RIDICULOUS!

"I've had a few flights where my attendant was young/pretty/thin, but still a b*tch."

Me too. I could care less whether flight attendants look like barbie and ken, it's so much more important that they make you feel comfortable, especially on long-haul flights, ugh. The next thing will probably be charging fares based on weight, or deducting any excess body weight from your luggage allowance.

Steven, what is it about the "typical walmart cashier" that makes them undesirable as flight attendants?

"I've had a few flights where my attendant was young/pretty/thin, but still a b*tch."

Was her name Naomi Campbell by any chance?

What is slightly disappointing about this issue is that it is an Indian airline. It is, perhaps, an indicator that certain Western values have permeated into other cultures... Drink Coke, Eat McDonald's, but don't get fat... a great set of values to export.

Jim, that is exactly how these values came to Brazil too, in particular for women. I onced worked at an all-female office and we ate lunch together, in a place where you pay by the weight of your food. I realized after a while that only 2 out of 14 women ate more than a 3oz lunch. Ever. 3oz for all the food they have on their plate, no seconds. That is what a WLS patient eats.

Somehow, dieting or watching your weight is undesirable, but of course, eating normal amounts of "regular" fattening foods will make you fat, so the weight management women here have adopted is simply eating tiny amounts of junk. If a WLS patient who is still fat has no energy eating that little, and needs massive amounts of vitamins and often liquid protein supplementation to be in good health eating that little, just imagine what they are doing to their health.

I just think this is outrageous. For one, that man is only 139 pounds and I'd like to know who conciders that fat? For 2, a persons weight has nothing to do with their personality. I know I would feel a lot safer standing next to a woman that was bigger than the terrorist than standing next to barbie screaming in my ear. C'mon. What is this world coming to. And I really have no clue how steven can even agree. More less, I probably do. HE's probably one of those perverts that like to grab on the flight attendants a**! This whole thing just does not make since at all, and I am not an overweight person, never has been, but it really pisses me off!

I can maybe see if you were so heavy that it was difficult to get around people's bags and push the little cart down the aisle, but I doubt this guy met that requirement. You know, my theory is that it was because he was a guy. People associate "airline steward/stewardess" with women, typically. I think the terrorist excuse was just that...a lame excuse.

I don't believe this story. Sounds like someone spiked the curry!

Reminds me of our own past.
I knew a woman who was a flight attendant when she was young (she was ~50 when we knew each other from local races)
She had a weight she had to keep, and appearance guidelines, including wearing makeup everyday.
To the time we met, she wore makeup even when she ran. Habit.

This story is ludicrous. If it effects their job, fire them when their job performance suffers... not based on some arbitrary number.

I am an airhostess and i way 62.54 kg and am a size 12, it is true that being fit and thin helps, she should have never applied for the job if she was that heavy, she could have put 100's of lives in danger!

it is ridiculous,right?

I'm 250lbs and i hate the way people stare at me and my pant size is 22-24 and it is embarrassing to see me have to go to the stores and get ugly clothes instead of cute ones!

The focus is always on the flight attendants weight because mostly women are in that position. If it were mostly men, it would not even be in a discussion here. I am a flight attendant, and I find it interesting how stereotypical this is. How about some of those really overweight pilots? Nobody ever talks about that. Are they not putting people's lives in danger? Nobody ever addresses that, because most pilots are men. Yet I heard about a very large pilot having a major heart attack in the cockpit at 700 feet above landing, and he was convulsing around the controls and the co-pilot had a very hard time landing the plane. He opened the door and yelled to the flight attendant to pull the Captain out of the seat because he was convulsing. This is when you hope that your flight attendant is an 800 lb. gorilla to pull him out of his seat! Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

This is an example of how far women's rights have progressed in the Western world. Up until about 30 years ago, flight attendants were all female, and had to be young and single. They were forced to quit when they reached the ripe old age of 30, or if they became married, pregnant or over their strict hiring weight.
Unfortunately, these same rules do not apply to all countries as yet. So the government sponsored airlines of certain countries can continue to require gender, age and weight restrictions.
It took years of fighting over rights and work rules to get to where we are in the Western world. Let's hope things will change for the rest of the world as well.

Tim Kirkwood, Author
The Flight Attendant Job Finder & Career Guide

Well i sort of agree with this story. Certainly in my case, i would prefer to fly with an airline which have good looking air hostesses. not all pretty ones are b*itches. in fact the "old and fat" air hostesses whom i have flown with (Air India and Indian Airlines) are fairly rude and in your face type.

Good thing it doesn't apply now. My boyfriend who's been with Philippine Airlines is already 42 yrs of age and has been with the company for 14 yrs. I've met his other colleagues and I can say that looks and weight don't really matter. If they do, then what are those seniors (in their 50's) doing at PAL?