Economical Jets Too Small for Big and Tall Fliers

As penny-pinching airlines make smaller jets, larger passengers get squeezed.

ByABC News
October 28, 2009, 8:36 AM

Oct. 28, 2009 — -- Lisa Tealer can't use seat-back trays when she's flying because she's "fat," she says. So the diversity executive of a biotech company in the San Francisco Bay Area uses her laptop as her tray. She uses candor about her weight to defuse awkward situations during boarding. "If I have to sit in the middle, I tell people, 'Hopefully, it won't be too uncomfortable for you.' "

Mark Diamond, a 6-foot-4 CEO of a technology firm in California, is an avid student of aircraft types so he can avoid the seat he most dreads — a bulkhead seat that keeps him from slipping his legs under the seat in front of him. "It's a lot of work. I hear guys who are 5-6 complain about how difficult flying is, and I'm like, 'You have no idea,' " he says.

Flying — an act that entails sitting still, often for hours, in a cramped space — has never been easy for those who carry more of themselves on board than others. But travelers who are heavy or tall are feeling the effects of airlines' penny-pinching moves more acutely than others.

The average legroom in coach is getting smaller. The seat width remains unchanged in decades even as Americans get bigger. Airlines are increasingly using small regional planes to serve less-popular destinations. To combat slow demand, they've eliminated capacity, resulting in fuller planes and stiffer competition for upgrades. And airlines' rules requiring obese passengers to pay for an extra seat are being enforced more strictly.

The controversy over paying for a second seat resurfaced earlier this year when United Airlines said it would follow other carriers in requiring overweight passengers in coach to buy a second ticket if two open seats aren't available. Passengers who can't lower their armrest and require more than one seat-belt extender must buy a second ticket at the price of the original ticket. United spokeswoman Robin Urbanski says it adopted the policy after receiving more than 700 complaints in 2008 from passengers who complained of an overweight seatmate encroaching on their space.