The app is designed by flight attendants with the goal of forcing the Transportation Department to do a better job of regulating cabin temperatures.
Flight attendants are asking you to not turn off your electronic devices so you can help them fight regulator inaction over an issue every frequent flier faces: too cold or too hot cabins. The Association of Flight Attendants released a statement and held an event yesterday at Reagan National Airport in Washington, DC, unveiling its new app 2hot2cold for airline passengers.
The flight attendants' goal is to have fliers report the temperature of their airplane cabin during and after a flight so that they can collect information and submit it to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) as well as the Department of Transportation (DOT).
"Today, the FAA and the DOT have no operating requirements for cabin temperatures. As a result, in the summer, cabins can get too hot; in the winter, they can get too cold," the AFA said in a release.
"Flight Attendants face these extreme conditions all too often. To make change, we need data to persuade regulators and legislators to establish airplane temperature standards. We define the problem with reports to get it fixed."
The app is available on iOS and Android devices and provides users with an easy way to submit information about their flight and its temperature. The AFA said temperature is important to how the flight is handled on their end and how passengers respond to the trip.
"If it's too hot, crew and passengers can experience symptoms ranging from the mild (fatigue, dizziness) to moderate (heat exhaustion) to catastrophic (heat stroke). If it's too cold, health effects range from cold stress to hypothermia," they wrote.
"Extreme temperatures also impact cabin operations, by degrading the crew's awareness of possible security threats, increasing stress that can lead to air rage, medical emergencies, a return to the gate, and other operational disruptions."
Pilots are generally in control of the thermostat on planes, but often make it colder than normal to accommodate flight attendants walking up and down the aisles in layered clothing. Passengers, who are not moving as much and frequently are dressed for vacation, often find flights too cold.
Some studies have shown that warmer temperatures cause passengers to be sick or pass out, and cold temperatures are believed to help with motion sickness.
The 50,000 members of the AFA along with 15,000 Southwest flight attendants tied to Local 556 of the Transport Workers Union believe that with the information gathered from passengers, they can convince the DOT to set firm parameters on plane temperatures.
Some airlines, like Korean Air, already set guidelines for plane temperature, but flight attendants are seeking better industry standards to address an issue that has gained prominence in recent years. The AFA statement said they would be distributing thousands of thermometers to flight attendants at 23 US airlines to mark the effort.
*this article was featured on Download.com on August 2, 2018: https://download.cnet.com/blog/download-blog/new-2hot2cold-app-lets-fliers-report-uncomfortable-cabin-temperatures/