Travellers who believe in their right to recline are suffering a clip in the air, writes Keith L. Alexander in Washington.
It's a recipe for air rage. You're settling in for the long flight when you get the urge to recline your seat. You push the arm-rest button, give a little shove backward - and nothing happens. You try again. Nothing. The seat won't budge. You investigate, and you discover that the passenger behind you has locked your seat in the upright position.
Welcome to world of the Knee Defender, a plastic palm-size clip that attaches to a passenger's tray table, preventing the seat in front from reclining.
The device, created by Ira Goldman (50), a former Capitol Hill staff member, has ignited a heated debate over the long-running issue of a passenger's right to recline. On one side sit those who happily pay the $10 cost of the device and even more happily fly cross-country without damage to their knees. On the other side are outraged travellers who just want to catch a little shut-eye in a comfy, reclining position - and think the clip unfairly intrudes on their private space.
"This is about protection, not space," says the 6ft-3in Goldman, who dreamed up the Knee Defender on an international flight behind a passenger who repeatedly banged a seat into his knees.
Goldman says he has sold about 1,000 of the clips through his website, www.kneedefender.com, since it was introduced a month ago.
In that short time, the device has sparked lively chatter in online travel discussions and has come under the scrutiny of the airlines and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Northwest Airlines has banned the gadget and ordered its flight attendants to be on the lookout for it. Other airlines, including United, US Airways and American, say they are studying the device's impact on passenger safety and comfort.
"We don't believe a passenger should interfere with another passenger's ability to recline their seats," says American Airlines spokesman Tim Wagner.
Flight attendants already have plenty of delicate on-board situations to referee and seeking out and seizing Knee Defenders would create "unbelievable tension between the flight attendants and passengers", says Jeff Zack, a spokesman for the Association of Flight Attendants.
FAA spokesman Paul Takemoto says the clips were not against federal aviation rules as long as they weren't used during taxiing, take-off or landing.
The Knee Defender sits on the arm of an open tray table, creating a wedge against the seat in front and blocking the seat from reclining. It comes with instructions urging users to comply with flight attendants' wishes and to "be polite to fellow passengers". The label also encourages passengers to "stand up for your right to sit down, in safety and good health".
Some travellers have figured out their own ways to prevent reclining, without recourse to the clip. Goldman says he knows of passengers who ball up blankets and wedge them between the seat and tray table, producing the same effect as his device.
The right to recline has been a touchy issue ever since an airline seat first popped backward - and the battle shows little sign of abating. Flying recently to Tahiti on Air France, Andrea T. Williams of New Hope, Pennsylvania, put her seat back only to have her hair pulled by the passenger behind her. Every time she reclined, Williams says, she was attacked. Her assailant hit her in the head and threw soda on her. "It was a nightmare," she says.
Williams stands by her right to recline, saying she would never buy Goldman's gadget.
"I think it's unfair to expect a passenger to sit upright in a very uncomfortable seat when he or she paid for the ticket to travel," she says.
- Washington Post service