How to Get Ahead

Dreaming of joining the glamorous world of airline cabin staff but just a mite under size? Itching to swan down the first class aisle doling out champagne but a fraction off the right stature? Keen to see the world but a little on the petite side? Help is at hand (or, rather, at head). After being approached by a woman who was marginally too short to qualify for an airline's minimum height requirements to land her 'dream job' of becoming a flight attendant, a Spanish surgeon has had a moment of inspiration.

Dr Luis de la Cruz has hit upon the wheeze of, rather than invasive and debilitating leg extension surgery, and more permanent than wearing Sarko-style Cuban heels, to add an inch or two by performing a 'head implant'. Yup, under local anaesthetic he just slips a silicon implant under the scalp and, hey presto, you're taller. "The patient is very happy with the result and is now an air stewardess," he reports.

He's subsequently performed the operation on 17 people, adding up to 2 inches to their height, at a cost of about £4,000 a time. However, people with thin faces beware - he says you shouldn't go for it as you'll look odd. In contrast to the pack of Mekons he's already done it on, we're sure. So if the flight attendant serving your next meal looks a bit like she's fresh from a Tefal advert, you'll know why.

While on the subject of cabin crew, pity the poor member of BA's staff working a flight out of Heathrow's Terminal Five recently. It's all a big enough shambles without having our favourite savage celebrity Naomi Campbell throwing a five star wobbly when her bag wasn't loaded. The notoriously short tempered super model went so berserk that BA have banned her from their flights for life. Although on current form that's not much a punishment.

Southern Exposure

A while ago we reported on the perils faced by intrepid cabin crew members when arriving at chilly destinations; the frozen feet suffered by stewardesses in court shoes standing at the bottom of the air stairs at Fairbanks, Alaska for half an hour being a prime cause for complaint. But even that ain't cold compared with a runway carved out of the ice in Antarctica.

Admittedly the crew working the flight probably won't be required to too much meeting and greeting as it's not (yet) a commercial service, but the Australian government have just started regular flights using an Airbus A319 to take scientists to their remote Casey research facility 45 miles from the Antarctic circle.

Working for the past three summers crews have carved out the two and a half mile long Wilkins runway on the 500 metre thick ice. Summer runs from mid-November to mid-February and boasts an average temperature of -23C (-10F). The runway has been named after Sir Hubert Wilkins, the pioneer who made the first flight in Antarctica 79 years ago.

The Antarctic Airlink Project will make the 4 hour 20 minute flight weekly from Hobart with an average of 20-30 passengers and cargo, with no plans as yet to carry tourists. Let's hear it for the pilot who landed an Airbus on, literally, a sheet of ice for the first time last month.

Air Navigation Rules

Pilots as a general rule are a group of people who are pleased with themselves and like to think they're a cut above the rest of humanity, never mind the cabin crew. They are certainly skilled people who have achieved a lot by earning the command of an aircraft and are usually more than happy to allow others to admire their prowess.

It's practically a rite of passage for new cabin crew members at an airline to have the chance to sit in the cockpit of the aircraft during a take-off and landing in order that they might gain an insight into what's going on the other side of the door. It's also not unusual for the pilot to take the chance to pull the newbie's chain a bit.

This was certainly the case when one unfortunate stewardess was observing the flight crew and asked how the managed to navigate from airport A to airport B. As luck would have it at that moment there was low cloud below the aircraft, a contrail above them and a high sun, which cast a dead straight shadow from the contrail onto the cloud below which stretched ahead of them. "Oh'" replied the pilot to her question, "we just follow the black line you see there." "Oh, I see..." answered the stewardess, thus confirming the flight crew's preconceptions about cabin crew's intellecual standing and earning herself years of mickey-taking.

Monarch as Cabin Crew

Alan Bennett's new book 'The Uncommon Reader' is a novel which examines the possibility of the Queen being an avid reader of fiction. In it he sympathises with the Queen's rather powerless, ceremonial and largely ignored role in the British government with the analogy "...she often felt not unlike an air hostess going through the safety procedures."

So there's a crumb of comfort for the cabin crew when they're demonstrating the use of the life jacket to ten rows of newspapers; that's what it feels like to be a head of state.

From Nurses to Flight Attendants

Today’s flight attendant has evolved from and idea by Ellen Church, a trained nurse, who in 1930 persuaded Boeing Air Transport (later to become United Airlines) to hire eight nurses to act as the first stewardesses.

Some airlines had already started using “cabin boys”, who loaded luggage and assisted passengers. Church argued that women in general, and uniformed nurses in particular, would not only present a more comforting presence but would also be able to deal with any ailment which a passenger suffered in flight.

The trial was a success and stewardesses quickly became a fixture in aircraft cabins. The passengers appreciated having someone on duty to provide drinks, sandwiches, a whiff of smelling salts in the case of a faint and chewing gum to alleviate ear ache. They also checked in the passengers, kept watch for fuel leaks and loaded the luggage.

The specifications for the job were very strict; they had to be trained nurses, be under 5 feet 4 inches in height and weigh less than 118 pounds, be aged between 20 and 26 years and be single. A training manual of the times dictated that “A rigid military salute will be rendered to the captain and co-pilot as they go aboard the plane and deplane before the passengers. Check with the pilots regarding their personal baggage and place it on board promptly.”