Chinese woman throws coins in to engine for good luck!

[LONDONER]

Anyone who's flown more than a couple of times in their life is aware that in major airports sometimes you have to take the passengers out to the plane to the far reaches of the airfield, instead of taxiing the airplane to the terminal for the passengers to board through a jet bridge without ever having any kind of access to the airplane's exterior parts. This is so in major airports (e.g. CDG) as well as minor ones. You're not gonna be able to do away with this procedure without significantly reducing flights able to take off per day, which is the same as to say it's not gonna happen.


And unless the airport left the passengers completely unattended (which doesn't happen because there are various kinds of personnel in attendance at the aircraft), these kinds of boardings are safe. And if they did do that, and leave the passengers unattended while they were boarding (I have never been to any airport in China, so I can't swear by their security protocols) then that was gross negligence on the part of the airport itself, and they are responsible for what happened. You can never leave the passengers unattended while they're boarding an aircraft, and I've never seen that happen in any of the European airports.

My only personal experience of flying on a Chinese airline was admittedly some years ago but then the observance of safety regulations was lax to say the least. Boarding was a free for all with passengers strugging to get on board carying an enormous amount of hand luggage and suitcases (!), so much that eventualy when everyone was finally seated the aisle was full of luggage as well. Had it been necessary to evacuate the plane it would have been impossible.