Now that we hear the news that the Etihad A380 may never take flight again, I wanted to write a post about why I had always felt bad for the economy class passengers that watched that safety video! 🙂
The Etihad A380 Safety Video
Honestly, I don’t know how many passengers actually do watch the safety videos on airplanes. My guess is “not enough” since airlines had transitioned to trying to make them more fun (I personally think Turkish always did a good job there). But, for customers in economy class on the Etihad A380, there was a small segment that I thought had to be a bit of a shocker for them!
One of the things I have disliked was when I traveled in economy on an aircraft where I had previously traveled in first class. I mean, once you know what is in the front of the plane, it is quite a bit harder to fly in the back! 🙂
But, if you were an economy class passenger on the Etihad A380, there was a portion of the safety video where it was showing where the life jackets are onboard. It proceeded to show where they were in the Residence cabin, business class, and economy class (under the seat, or the couch in the Residence cabin). Seeing the Residence is bad enough!
There was a quick cut to the First Apartment to show that the life jackets in these seats were next to the seat itself. The tough thing was actually seeing that “hey, there is a seat like THAT on this plane?!” Imagine you are getting settled into your economy seat – 10 across on the A380 – and you are watching the video and you see images of the First Apartment! That has to be tough, knowing there is that kind of space just above you (economy class was downstairs, the First Apartment upstairs).
Here is that portion of the video.
The funny thing is that the owner of this video expressed his surprise in the description that there was a “residential cabin in the aircraft.” So, yes, there were many that found out about the more luxurious accommodations just from watching the safety video! 🙂
Imagine if they showed safety video about what happens if you are in the shower and everyone would be like, “a SHOWER?!“
The best thing was that I never did pay cash for any of my Etihad A380 First Apartment flights – I paid as little as 40,000 AA miles to 60,000 AA miles (ah, the days of flying from the Middle East to Australia in first class for just 60K miles!).
Thanks, Charlie, for a post that made me smile. I knew someone who said they would never fly business class or higher until they could afford it all the time, because it’s too hard to go back. But I, like you, go for the good seats when I can get them with points/miles. I have flown business lots of times but never First, that is my goal, sadly not in The Apartment though.
I definitely agree that it makes it harder! And, don’t worry – there are some other tremendous first class rides out there! I am looking forward to trying the new Emirates or the new Singapore first class cabins myself!
I don’t think I can ever afford to pay first class on my own. It is thanks to miles/points that I have flown on A380 in premium cabins. I do fly economy from time to time to make myself appreciate first/business class even more. I do think economy is totally fine especially if the flight is barely full (ie less than 50% capacity). Back in 2009 during the recession I flew Emirates A380 in economy and the entire back section of the lower deck was empty!