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A row has flared up between leading plane-makers over the width of tourist-class seats on long-distance flights, setting the tone for a bitter confrontation over health and comfort at this month’s Dubai Airshow.
The dispute focuses on the width of seats provided on long-haul flights for economy passengers, not always the ones most courted by airlines, but whose allocated space holds the key to efficiency claims for the latest jets offered by Airbus and Boeing.
Airbus this week called for an industry standard that would provide for a seat at least 18 inches (46cm) wide in economy cabins, but its US arch-rival Boeing says it should be for airlines to decide.
The dispute comes as plane-makers vie to sell ever-larger versions of their twin-engine long-distance aircraft, with potentially record orders expected at the November 17-21 event.
Boeing says its revamped 777X will hold 406 people based on economy seats over 17 inches wide and set out 10 in each row. Airbus says the competing version of its A350 will carry 350 people in 18-inch-wide economy seat laid out nine abreast.
Airbus is appealing directly to the public ahead of the Dubai Airshow, where the 777X is expected to dominate with over 100 orders.
It recently previewed what may be the start of a new ad war by showing financiers a slide illustrating three people squashed together at a restaurant, titled ‘Would You Accept This?’
As diets change, people get bigger but plane seating has not radically changed.
Airbus says that is not enough for long-haul travel and says its rival is sticking to a seat concept from the 1950s, when the average girth of the newly christened ‘jet set’ was narrower.
Airbus says it has commissioned research suggesting an extra inch in seat width improves sleep quality by 53 per cent.
Boeing disputes Airbus’s figures on seat measurements and says it is not up to manufacturers to step into decisions on how airlines balance fares and facilities. It also says research shows cabin experience depends on more than the width of a seat.
