A man traveling on a Delta Airlines flight has been left without a functioning laptop after the person in front of him reclined their seat and cracked his screen. Yikes...
Pat Cassidy - a film producer and podcast host - took to Twitter to call out Delta Airlines, after his laptop screen was completely damaged by someone reclining their seat in front of him.
He wrote alongside the photo of his destroyed Mac: "small note for the suggestion box, maybe have a little warning sign or someway to prevent my laptop from being destroyed when the person in front of me reclines their seat."
The 37-year-old then tweeted Delta again, adding: "Also, this one is more of a critique than a suggestion. I really appreciate that your flight attendant came over to tell me that the passenger in front of me 'needs to be able to recline' and then asked him 'if he was okay?' as if your seat hadn't just ruined my livelihood."
After the ordeal and several complaints later, Cassidy updated his almost 13,000 Twitter followers on the situation, writing that nothing much had really been resolved and that he wasn't offered a replacement laptop and that there are still no warnings on the seat backs.
All of this begs the question: What's the deal with reclining seats? Is it necessary, or should it be banned?
Well, CNN has reported that reclining airplane seats are, well, on the decline. In fact, at one point all economy seats had the option to recline, whereas these days there appear to be more and more models that don't have the option.
The outlet detailed how the ability to recline seats places an extra cost on the airline, given that this function requires extra parts that a regular upright seat doesn't have.
Then, reclining seats also add extra weight to the aircraft, with CNN detailing that most airplane seats are roughly between 15 and 22 pounds per passenger, and that any weight that can be saved on the flight can significantly reduce the amount of fuel.
Obviously, having seats that don't fall back saves the hassle of the awkward seat reclining etiquette as well, especially when one person reclines so far back they break a laptop screen!
German seatmaker Recaro has become well-known for their pre-reclined seats for short-haul flights. Recaro's CEO Mark Hiller told CNN: "The airline can choose a pre-defined backrest angle position of 15 or 18 degrees within the seat configuration process. This helps to provide either more comfort via increased backrest angle or fulfil special layouts with specific passenger counts."
Hiller added: "The main advantage is increased living space, as a passenger's living space is not intruded by recline. In addition, the low total cost of ownership - fewer moveable parts on the seat, improved reliability and simplified maintenance - and low weight and cost, with no mechanism, kinematics and so on required."
As for whether reclining should be banned, we should probably leave that up to you guys. What do you think? To recline or not to recline, that is the question!