On Aeroflot, you must wear a mask or you will be denied boarding. Onboard, you must keep your mask on or face an unspecified punishment. But if you don’t keep your mask on, you’ll be accommodated in a special section in the rear of the plane and allowed to travel without your mask. So which is it?
Aeroflot Offers Mask-Free Section Onboard Instead of Flight Diversion
This isn’t a “mask or non-mask” question like the days of smoking sections. Quite the contrary, Aeroflot just tightened up it mask polices onboard. A press release issued on Tuesday notes:
Safety of passengers and crew is the airline’s top priority. Passengers can only be accepted for flight on condition that they abide by requirements for use of personal protective equipment. The airline takes tough stance against violators. Passengers who refuse to duly wear face masks for any reasons will be denied boarding.
The airline reminds, passengers must use a protective mask that fully covers their mouth and nose, at boarding and throughout the flight. A face mask can be removed to be changed and during meals.
Passengers who can’t wear masks for medical or other reasons will not be admitted to flight.
According to the press release, no exceptions whatsoever exist. But a leaked memo reveals that Aeroflot will not divert flights for those who do not comply. Instead, it will create a small anti-mask section in the rear of economy class. Passengers who refuse to wear a mask will be seated there. No other consequences were noted.
An Aeroflot spokesperson confirmed:
“It is critically important for us to ensure the safety of all passengers. Dedicated seats are allocated to passengers who declare their refusal to use masks after the doors are closed” This does not exclude the application of other measures of liability for violation of the rules for the use of personal protective equipment on board.”
CONCLUSION
I personally think an anti-mask section makes more sense than diverting a flight. Nevertheless, Aeroflot is sending mixed messaging about masks, almost like a wink-wink sort of thing where passengers are told the “rules” but the rules are not actually enforced.
Have you flown Aeroflot during the pandemic? What was compliance like?
image: Aeroflot
I interpreted it as:
We will continue treat noncompliance in the same general manner as before (no-fly list, police meet the aircraft, whatever…based on complexity/severity) but in an effort to protect the pax/crew, we’ll segregate these as*holes from GenPop by putting them in their own section and avoid inconveniencing everyone by diverting.
I see it as a public shaming combined with a need to keep a better eye on them for the rest of the flight and keep them away from those abiding by the rules and are presumably healthy and not looking to catch COVID.
Being stuck in the back of the plane, where the lousiest and most cramped seats are IS the punishment for not wearing a mask. That threat would sure scare me into not daring to go maskless…
I have flown Aeroflot several times, and they actually do enforce masks. The flight attendants pass through the aisles every now and then and ask passengers to wear masks quite firmly. “No masks” rows must be a new thing, as in November there was no such thing on their flights. But if you fly business class and have no one on the adjacent seat in your row, you can stay without a mask – at least no one bugged me when I did not wear a mask
So normal people have to potentially wait in line for the lav by them or possibly on a full flight sit by these idiots? That makes bringing back smoking on all flights sound like a comparatively wonderful idea.
It makes good sense to me. If someone absolutely refuses to put a mask back on, then what are the choices for an airline? Divert? Concede? Have three or four guys physically restrain the offender, shackle them and force a mask on, which will inevitably result in dozens of videos appearing on social media followed by claims of excessive force, human rights abuse etc?
Whatever they do, until the flight arrives, the people sitting around the offender will have valid concerns that they are at increased risk of infection. Having no-maskers sit together in a dedicated area alleviates the risk to others until the flight arrives.
The important line here is: “This does not exclude the application of other measures of liability for violation of the rules for the use of personal protective equipment on board.” Once the flight arrives, they will then be dealt with for failing to comply with crew instructions, reckless endangerment or whatever charges they choose.
Awesome…wish US airlines would do the same