MARKET WATCH COLUMNIST
“Reclining seats cause for in-air warfare”, Ellis Henican Column, Newsday, August 31, 2014
Are you a recliner or a legroomer? In the zero-sum battle for flying comfort, everyone has to choose.
Well, maybe not everyone. For five times the price, you can still purchase a precious few inches in first class. But for the rest of us, flying equals narrow rows, crowded planes and a simmering hostility over seating angle that’s breaking into open warfare.
On Wednesday, an American Airlines Miami-to-Paris flight was diverted to Boston after a fight broke out between a leaning woman and the cramped man behind her. Last Sunday, a Newark-to-Denver trip on United made an unscheduled stop in Chicago so the crew could eject a man with a Knee Defender and a woman who threw water in his face.
The Knee Defender, an ingenious and provocative little gadget invented by 6-foot-3 Ira Goldman, stops the passenger in front of you from tilting back, bruising your knees, spilling your coffee, triggering your claustrophobia and leaving you jealous at the comparative comfort enjoyed by Volkswagen clowns. So of course, most airlines have already banned the Knee Defender.
Apparently, the rising fares, disgruntled attendants, dinky snacks and gouging fees for everything but a trip to the lavatory weren’t enough to signal how airline executives really feel about the human cargo. Can high-flying pay toilets be far behind?
Really, there are only three choices here.
The airlines can jam fewer rows in the planes, which seems unlikely. They can disable the recline buttons, which is probably what’s next.
Or they can give up seats entirely, turning all flights into standing-room-only trips. But don’t worry. For an extra $50, you can reserve a spot near a pole.
JET BLUES
- “Mind if I use your head as a tray table?”
- “Don’t worry, I can still read my laptop through the cracked screen.”
- “Shouldn’t we be engaged first?”
- “If you quit reclining, I’ll quit playing knee bongo on your spine.”
- “I’ve always hated flying alone.”
ASKED AND UNANSWERED
Surprised by that record-breaking $10,000 fine for illegal basement rentals in Long Beach? So how long will a pack-’em-in landlord need to recoup a number like that?…Is the multi-level deck becoming the new LI-home status symbol? Or is it just the latest threat to the vanishing era of open backyards?…When did “rip tides” become “rip currents”? Hurricane Cristobal’s RCs caused swim bans at Jones Beach, Hither Hills and Robert Moses beaches…Any surprise that generous LIers have opened their hearts and the their homes to 2,200 unaccompanied young immigrants, tops in the tri-state? Did I mention how generous LIers can be?…What made the KKK target Hampton Bays? Have the White Knights found a single recruit in the “Good Ground” hamlet?…Whaddaya mean LI doesn’t manufacture much anymore? Did you see Real Capital Analytics’ data on skyrocketing prices for industrial real estate? Up 133 percent in Nassau, up 223 percent in Suffolk—in just one year…Who you gonna call when a 30-year-old movie opens with all the buzz of a hot new film? Could it be “Ghostbusters”?
THE NEWS IN SONG
Everybody wanna try to box me in
“Fly”
by
NIcki Minaj
LONG ISLANDERS OF THE WEEK
JUSTIN GAU AND KYLE PAGE
Can these two please get dinner now? 
The volunteer Commack EMTs were about to order at the Hauppauge Applebee’s when a faulty water heater set their carbon-monoxide detector wailing, sparking a total evacuation and interrupting a perfectly nice meal. Everyone was recalling the leak that killed a Legal Sea Foods manager at the Walt Whitman Mall in February and sent 27 to the hospital. All in a night’s work, the Commack EMTs say.
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