Put this one under the category of trying to find a silver lining in a dark cloud.
The near-tragedy of the January 5 incident on an Alaska Airlines plane, when a side panel blew off in the middle of a flight, has renewed interest in the debate over whether children should sit on parents’ laps.
Experts are discouraging parents from holding infants and toddlers on their lab during flight.
"If there had been a passenger holding a kid close to where that panel blew off, the explosive force was such that a kid being held would have been torn from the hands of their parents, and they would have been sucked out of the plane," Kwasi Adjekum, assistant professor at University of North Dakota’s Department of Aviation, said to Fox News.
The pilot successfully guided the plane to an emergency landing and there were no injuries, be it adults or children.
But it certainly has raised the specter of the ‘what if’ dilemma.
Dr. Dyan Hes, a pediatrician, said she believes airlines should make car seats mandatory for young children on flights.
"You want to keep your child the most safe, and the most safe on an airplane is in a restrained car seat, because most children who are injured on planes are injured from turbulence," she said. "I actually think it should be that the FAA says that you have to buy a seat. That's the only reason the parents are not, because they're given the option not to and hold them on their laps."
National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said she was initially concerned that there were four unaccompanied minors on the Alaska Airlines flight.
There could be a possible solution if airlines did not charge parents for a full seat, but instead charge for a restraint device.
"… The airlines feel that driving has higher rates of mortality, so that, statistically speaking, a child might have a higher rate of mortality from a car accident," Hes said.
Keith M. Cianfrani, an aviation safety consultant, said "I don't understand that mentality" of not using a child safety seat on an airplane. It's all about risk management. During turbulence or in an emergency, that child is now going to become a mobile projector."
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