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Cheap Drunks
Cheap Charlie · June 5, 2000

I have reached the point recently that I can not understand why the airlines are still serving hard liquor on airplanes. I think it is time that the airlines go back to the old days of the 1970s where passengers were only served two drinks during any flight.

Now, don't get the idea that I am some sort of crusading teetotaler. I love my drink. My friends and anyone who has seen me in action at a party can attest to that fact. I love wine and beer with my meals. But, enough is enough. It's time the airlines took responsibility for their own action on this issue.

People who fly know that dehydration is one of the major problems faced by passengers on modern aircraft flying at high altitude. The best drink is water, water and then a bit more water. Alcohol dehydrates passengers rather than hydrating them. Plus, studies have shown that alcohol is more intoxicating at high altitude in aircraft where drinkers get less oxygen.

These factors can be debated ad nauseum, but there are more practical reasons to get hard liquor limited on aircraft. In fact, I think distilled spirits such as scotch, bourbon, vodka and gin should be banned from flight service, but that won't probably happen in the near future.

The limit to two drinks may have a chance.

Recent headlines have related incidents of flight attendants and sometimes pilots having to face down intoxicated passengers during flights. Planes have been turning around after takeoff from JFK for years to deposit unruly drunken passengers in places like Portland, Maine.

Some rumors are circulating that the recent attack on a pilot in the cockpit during flight was to some degree related to alcohol.

Last October, according to Reuters, two strangers allegedly indulged in drunken sex on a transatlantic flight and were charged with public indecency. It reported the two Britons flying business class on an American Airlines flight from Dallas to Manchester in northwest England on Friday were reported by cabin crew for their lewd and drunken behavior.

The Sun newspaper said the man and woman, both married to other partners, knocked back free wine and brandy before cuddling together under a blanket. She then stripped to her underwear and performed oral sex, the newspaper said. "Nothing and no one could stop them. It would have taken a bucket of cold water," it quoted an airline source as saying.

Police said the two were arrested on arrival at Manchester and charged with an act of outraging public decency contrary to common law, being drunk on board an aircraft, and conduct causing harassment, alarm or distress. Both were bailed to appear at Manchester Magistrates Court on November 1.

"We take all these matters very seriously," a spokesman for American Airlines said.

OK. We hear them. This begs the question: What is actually being done? Research indicates that flight attendants are being taught ways to slow down excess drinking by passengers. They may claim that the liquor is already locked up for the rest of the flight. Some airlines actually water down the drinks. Others serve sober passengers first taking as much time between drinks as possible for those who look like trouble.

The bottom line is that this is pussyfooting around the problem. It is time to set a simple restriction on how many drinks someone can have while in the air. Base it on the old pre-1970s rule of a two-drink limit. Or, base it on a drink an hour for longer flights. But the airlines should do something more than taking the matter "very seriously" before something more serious takes place.

Charlie Leocha is the Boston-based author of Travel Rights: Know the Rules of the Road and the Air Before You Go. Cheap Charlie appears every Monday on this site. E-mail him at charlie@ticked.com or access his Web site.