I generally detest air stairs (versus a jet bridge) not so much because of the stairs themselves, but because it means a remote gate and crowded bus trip to or from the terminal. But now I have a more urgent reason to frown upon air stairs: they make severe injury much more likely.
Qatar Airways Remote Stand – Man Falls Downs Stairs
After arriving in Doha, we pulled up at a remote stand, a familiar occurrence at Hamad International Airport. Despite a modern new airport, there are insufficient gates to handle all the traffic. That meant our A350-1000, full of passengers, had to unload far from the terminal, with passengers filing on to busses.
I said goodbye to flight attendants and even snapped a picture of the stairs, more annoyed than anything else about the inconvenience.
But my annoyance quickly turned to horror as a I heard a commotion and watched a man tumble down the stairs, landing hard on the tarmac.
Everyone froze. Passengers. Fight attendants. Ground staff. The man was bleeding bad. On his head. He grimaced in agony. His companion called for help.
A member of ground staff knelt down to check on him while another radioed for help.
We continued to wait, but were soon advised to continue to exit the aircraft.
I felt like the priest or the Levite walking around the critically injured man on the road to Jerusalem.
But what I could do? Hopefully a good Samaritan was on his way.
I was ushered onto a bus where the doors shortly shut and we took off for terminal. I have no idea what happened to the man, a very aged senior citizen.
Forcing senior citizens and those who may have difficulty walking to trudge down a steep flight of stairs with their baggage is unconscionable. Even if this man survived his wounds without broken bones or a head injury, the shock of the fall and his aged body will sadly require months of recovery…maybe even years.
CONCLUSION
Air stairs can be very dangerous. Take one step at a time, hold the handrails, and if you cannot carry luggage, ask someone nearby or a member of ground staff. Don’t push it, like this man did, and find yourself lying on the ground in a pool of blood.
When Frontier announced they are going to add more gates in DEN and use stairs my first thought was that it won’t last long. They are not safe for elderly people and the first time someone falls (especially during a Denver winter) and they get hit with a lawsuit it will end real fast.
Most stair gates in the US use ramps now for ADA access.
Qatar onboard is World Class. Before and after boarding, Third Class.
Same goes for Delta..
But my annoyance quickly turned to honor… (typo)
Quite a prolific typo!
In defense of Matt’s clumsy, inarticulate grammar and spelling woes that have caused much heartache on this forum:
It’s not a typo. A typo is when a finger meant for one key either accidentally hits another or two keys are pressed at once. But what actually happens for what most people call “typos” are interesting verbal to written accidents we usually catch when writing more slowly.
For example, when your making mistakes typing you’re sentence. That’s not a typo. We know that “you’re” is “you are” but “your” is different, but they SOUND the same and as we type, our mind translates the SOUNDS into words even if the words have different meanings.
It’s an understandable mistake and can be difficult to catch even when proofreading since the opposite effect will happen in our minds: We’ll translate the written, er, typed word into a sound and our mind will fail to catch that the word sounds the same as another with a different meaning. Consider that my 5 year old daughter doesn’t learn English in the written sense but verbally first so when she says “your” or “you’re”, they’re exactly the same in sound but the meaning is interpreted on the fly. We don’t “think” in terms of “you’re” and “your”.
For those who are in a perpetual state of annoyance over this state of affairs, may I suggest learning German or Polish where such issues are reduced? But only in German are you going to find words such as this: Freundschaftsbeziehungen or in Polish, where the number two can be said in 17 different ways (and no pun intended, counting. I’m sure we’ll find more!)
Polish – two (2)
1. dwa
2. dwie
3. dwoje
4. dwóch (or dwu)
5. dwaj
6. dwiema
7. dwom (or dwóm)
8. dwoma
9. dwojga
10. dwojgu
11. dwojgiem
12. dwójka
13. dwójki
14. dwójkę
15. dwójką
16. dwójce
17. dwójko
This is why Poland cannot hold onto empires: Snarky spelling and grammar correctors slow down the army.
So the stairs that presidents or other fancy people take look much nicer and safer. Surely not those steep, rusty slippery metal things that the rest of us have to contend with. Why can’t they just make some better steps. It can’t be all that expensive.
At least those in the photo are covered. I have difficulty understanding how the ones that expose people to the elements remain legal.
There have been many Presidents that have slipped and fell. Until one seriously gets hurt probably nothing will be done.
A terrible story. Perhaps because of the Americans with disabilities act, and hopefully common sense, stairs are on their way out. Instead I’ve been seeing a lot of winding ramps that are wheelchair accessible and less dangerous. For example at Long Beach, CA.
This is a good example of why replacing these stairs with the much more accessibility friendly air passenger ramps is a good idea.
I don’t understand the rationale at Doha for steps, I’ve arrived there more times than I can think of and we’ve parked on a remote stand when there are plenty of gates at the terminal empty. The only time it seems guaranteed to get a proper gate is when the service is operated by an A380 otherwise it’s a lottery and more annoyingly so because there are empty gates.
More gates with airbridges are on the way.
An article from September 2020…
“ The second phase of the airport’s expansion consists of Phase A and B. Phase A of the current expansion will comprise of the central concourse linking concourses D and E. Construction is to commence by early 2021 and will increase the airport’s capacity to more than 53 million passengers annually by 2022. Phase B, which will be completed after 2022, will extend concourses D and E to further enhance Hamad Airport’s capacity to more than 60 million passengers annually.”
While I have sympathy for the injured man, what makes these stairs any different from another flight of stairs, all capable of causing injury? He certainly could have waited for assistance if he could not negotiate these stairs by himself.
While climbing stairs may take away from the “Qsuites” experience (eyeroll), I have been stuck on the tarmac at US airports enough hours waiting for delayed planes to leave our gates to know that I would much rather deplane and get bussed.
Two possible reasons why these stairs are more dangerous:
1. People have carry-on luggage which can shift the passengers’ center of gravity where not expected, and
2. The passengers could have been sitting for many hours in a confined space and their leg muscles are tight.
There could be more.
Hand luggage makes a huge difference. I have no mobility issues and I find it pretty challenging to move up and down those steps carrying a 12kg cabin case and a light ‘personal item’. If it’s raining, I am full of fear and trepidation before getting on the steps. Indeed, the steps are one of the reasons why I sometimes put the personal item into my checked luggage against airline recommendations (it’s a CPAP machine).
That’s one of the rare aspects of air travel where IS flying experience is superior to Europe.
The amount of budding at airports like FRA and AMS is shocking to me.
all air stairs have a fixed stair case and one movable stair , depending on air craft type ( think height) there will be one step between the top and bottom that may or maynot be the same height as the rest of the staircase
Do they not have ramps for the widebodies like you’d find for 737s at Burbank, Denver etc?
I don’t think I have ever seen one of those ramps, and I have had to go up and down steps in dozens of airports all over the world. I think they are extremely rare outside of the USA.
Many European airports also have an overall lack of seating and give users the feeling of being trapped in a labyrinth. There’s no reason why any of them should take as long to get through as they do.
Hope you can highlight this to the Airline or Airport.
How do they accommodate people in wheelchairs or on walkers with these stairs?
They usually use a vehicle that lifts up, similar to a mobile lounge or catering truck, and bring it to a different door.
Noel Philips has a good video on it.
Thank you. Planning for bringing dad on his first flight since he started needing a walker (he can do one or two stairs, but a full set like these would be impossible).
Hamad Airport is a bad copy paste of Hong Kong, in Qatar they choose to build a new airport over water having plenty of desert land, on top, half of the airport surface is wasted having the cargo facilities, operations center, duty free… they are now expanding west of the runway 34L, expect longer bus time to reach the aircraft and more stairs.
My sister fell down a flight of stairs at a small airport in the States. She was 8 and carrying a bunch of bags and refused the flight attendant’s offer to help her. Luckily she was ok, and the captain came and picked her up. My mother ran out onto the tarmac (this was way before 911) and grabbed her from the pilot, saying she can’t believe no one helped her. I later told my mother how the flight attendant had offered to help her and she refused. My mother said the attendant should have intervened regardless.
Qatar needs to do a better job with suggesting that elderly and frail passengers take the lift option and not attempt the stairs. They are dangerous, as you note.
That said, as a business class passenger, arriving at a remote gate is actually better. There is a dedicated business class bus(ses) and the busses drop you off right at the transfer security facility, which saves a lot of walking. It’s pretty efficient too, in my experience.
Last month I came across an even better system with Ethiopian at ADD. Business class buses for all flights board from the same gate- the one located directly opposite the business class lounge. That way premium pax avoid both unnecessary walking and queues at the gate. It’s such an obvious solution that it makes you wonder why it doesn’t happen elsewhere!
The one advantage, I find with being bussed to the terminal, is the short walk to the immigration/baggage reclaim areas.
I fell down stairs disembarking from a flight at a different airport. Permanent lifelong injury to my foot and back. They are dangerous. Airlines use them to get passengers off the plane quicker because it costs them money for every minute the plane sits on the tarmac. Profit over safety as always. It will take a class action to stop them. Lone individuals who are injured can’t take on a big corporation so nothing happens.