The Federal Aviation Administration says it has refused to force airlines to offer more legroom, rejecting calls for legal minimums.
The Federal Aviation Administration has refused to implement a legal minimum legroom, saying shrinking seat size is not a safety concern.
Flyers Rights, a group which describes itself as the largest US airline passenger organisation, had gone to court to prod the agency to act.
It argued that shrinking seat sizes represented a potential hazard in the case of an emergency.
The FAA, however, concluded that in the case of an emergency, there is “no evidence that a typical passenger, even a larger one, will take more than a couple of seconds to get out of his or her seat.”
The agency said it takes more time for flight attendants to open the exit door than it does for passengers to get up from their seats.
Seat pitch – the distance between your seat and the one directly in front of you – has decreased from an average of 35 inches to 31 inches. It can sometimes measure just 28 inches.
According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, the average weight of a woman today is equal to that of the average man in the 1960s: 166 pounds (75 kg).
The average man now weighs almost 196 pounds (88 kg).
Men pack a 40-inch waistline, whilst women measure at 38 inches.
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