Airplane Manufacturers Focusing on Comfort

The industry's newest designs seek to make air travel more pleasurable. You stagger off a long flight, feeling sticky, tired and dehydrated. You're still fuming at the flight attendant who abruptly turned on the cabin lights, awaking you from a moment's sleep.

Picture this instead: Starting in 2008, major aircraft makers say, the newest planes will feature fresher air, soothing lights and bigger windows. They're even talking about such amenities as showers and bunk beds, while admitting those are less likely to wind up in typical airliners.

Flying through the sky in a cramped tube may never be anyone's idea of heaven, but the world's biggest aircraft manufacturers are building jets that they claim will be more comfortable than ever, inaugurating an era of more tolerable air travel.

Veteran fliers have heard such sales pitches before.

American Airlines, for instance, six years ago eliminated two rows of coach-class seats from every plane in its 700-jet fleet to give passengers 3 inches to 5 inches more legroom. Some of the work was done at the company's Tulsa Maintenance & Engineering Center, where the company employs about 7,000 workers.

Seeking more income after the impact of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, however, the carrier ended the program on some of its planes in 2003.

Along with more leg room, travelers also have been promised amenities such as on-board luxury lounges, gyms and restaurants. The proposals often ran into major obstacles: The carriers weren't interested.

Just like American Airlines, most carriers have been struggling to earn a profit and are looking to maximize earnings per seat rather than add amenities.

This time, however, rival aircraft manufacturers Boeing and Airbus say they've got it right. They're building jets that don't give the airlines a choice on many of the amenities, such as bigger windows, that passengers say they want most.

For the first time, Boeing is even limiting the type of seats airlines can choose to put in coach on its newest jet, forcing carriers to chose from an approved catalogue.

"We are trying to prevent the airlines from reducing the flying experience," said Kenneth Price, a marketing director at Boeing.

The improvements will appear first on Boeing's 787 Dreamliner, the first of which is scheduled to be delivered to customers in 2008. The Dreamliner cabin will be pressurized to a level typical of elevations 6,000 feet above sea level, Boeing says, compared with the current pressure, equivalent to an elevation of about 8,000 feet. Price says studies have shown that improving the cabin pressure significantly reduces headaches and other ailments.

Boeing also intends to make the Dreamliner cabin more humid, eliminating the bone-dry air that annoys many passengers. Together, higher pressure and more humidity should help temper the effects of jet lag, Boeing says.

The advancements will come from the use of composite materials to build the plane's fuselage. Boeing is using super-strong, lightweight composites to make the Dreamliner more fuel-efficient, an attractive feature for airline executives who have ordered 432 of the planes. But the company isn't shy about trumpeting the other benefits of composites: It's these stronger, more corrosion-resistant materials that will permit the higher cabin pressure and higher humidity.

"The physical environment, especially for the long-haul traveler, is going to be very different," Price said.

Boeing has patented a seating configuration to improve the chance that a passenger will end up next to an empty seat if the airplane is not fully booked. The Dreamliner will have a better air circulation and filtering system than on current planes, larger windows and a wider cabin, executives say.

Price said the improvements will not only be standard on the Dreamliner but also are likely to be on next generation of Boeing aircraft.

Fuselage and wing components for Boeing airplanes are built in Tulsa at Spirit AeroSystems, a former Boeing plant that was bought last year by Toronto-based Onex Inc. Spirit, which employs 1,500 locally, is hiring about 300 engineers to work on the Dreamliner.

Airbus will make many of the same features -- such as better cabin pressure and humidity -- standard on its A350 XWB, a competitor to the Dreamliner that was officially approved by Airbus parent EADS last week and could enter service by 2012.

Boeing is testing ways to use lights to give the appearance of more space on board. Melanie Kimsey, a Boeing design engineer, recently studied Las Vegas productions such as Cirque du Soleil to understand how its shows use lighting.

"We wanted to see what techniques and tricks they use and see if any of those can be scaled down to work on an airplane," Kimsey said.

Boeing and Airbus already offer airlines better lighting on some jets and plan to make such features standard on the Dreamliner and A350 XWB. The new lights won't be as harsh as current ones and will be easier to dim and brighten, the manufacturers say.

Some proposed features will probably never appear on commercial jets, however.

Boeing's in-flight shower is one example. The device shoots a fine mist of water on passengers. But airlines have expressed little interest in the shower, which would take up valuable space on planes, Boeing concedes.

This story was written by the Washington Post, with additional reporting by the Tulsa World Business staff.

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