Fat Passengers Weighty Problem For Air Carriers
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ATLANTA – Heavy suitcases aren’t the only things weighing down airplanes and requiring them to burn more fuel, pushing up the cost of flights. A new government study reveals that airlines increasingly have to worry more about the weight of their passengers.
America’s growing waistlines are hurting the bottom lines of airline companies as the extra pounds on passengers are causing a drag on planes. Heavier fliers have created heftier fuel costs, according to a government study.
Through the 1990s, the average weight of Americans increased by 10 pounds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The extra weight caused airlines to spend $275 million to burn 350 million more gallons of fuel in 2000 – just to carry the additional weight of Americans, the federal agency estimated in a recent issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
“The obesity epidemic has unexpected consequences beyond direct health effects,” said Dr. Deron Burton of the CDC. “Our goal was to highlight one area that had not been looked at before.”
The extra fuel burned also had an environmental impact, as an estimated 3.8 million extra tons of carbon dioxide were released into the air, according to the study. The agency said its calculations are rough estimates, issued to highlight previously undocumented consequences of the ongoing obesity epidemic.
The estimates were calculated by determining how much fuel the 10 extra pounds of weight per passenger represented in Department of Transportation airline statistics, Dr. Burton said.
Obesity is a life-or-death struggle in America, the underlying cause of 400,000 deaths in 2000, a 33% jump from 1990.
A CDC survey conducted from 1999 to 2002 showed that 65% of Americans were overweight.
Although the Air Transport Association of America has not yet validated the CDC data, spokesman Jack Evans said the health agency’s appraisal “does not sound out of the realm of reality.”
With most airlines reporting losses blamed partly on record-high fuel costs, carriers are doing everything they can to lighten the load on all aircraft.
