Flight attendants apparently want you to stop doing this one gross habit when traveling on planes.
Getting comfy on a flight often means slipping off your shoes, popping on a neck pillow, and settling in with a few movies.
But whether you're 'rawdogging' the long-haul journey or peacefully drifting off in the safest seat on the plane, your flight crew is hard at work keeping you safe.
And it seems it's become an all-too-common plane habit for passengers to walk to the bathroom without shoes on - and flight attendants are begging travelers to please stop doing it.
Advert
Flight crew have voiced how often they see people going into the lavatory, either completely barefoot or in socks - apparently even Presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr. was accused of it.
“Passengers use the bathrooms all the time on the airplane with either bare feet or with only socks on,” Elizabeth Regan, a flight attendant at a commercial airline, told HuffPost.
According to Hilary Clark, inflight services director for California-based private jet company Planet 9 and former commercial flight attendant, using the restroom barefoot is “unhygienic and should always be avoided.”
As gross as it sounds, it seems that the “liquid on the lavatory floor is often more than just water,” Clark admitted. Which means your feet (and everything your feet come into contact with) are coming into contact with all kinds of nasty germs. “It is completely unsanitary,” Regan added.
A 2015 study from TravelMath found the flush button in aeroplane toilets had 265 colony-forming units (CFUs) per square inch, while a home toilet seat carried 172 CFU. While these microbes may not pose a massive threat to most healthy adults, they’re still not something you want to drag back to your seat.
“Aeroplane lavatories are used frequently by many passengers during flights, leading to high-touch surfaces such as door handles, flush buttons, sink faucets, and toilet seats becoming contaminated with various pathogens,” said Dr. Dahlia Philips, an infectious disease physician and medical director for MetroPlusHealth’s Partnership in Care Special Needs Plan. “Walking barefoot exposes your feet to bacteria, viruses and fungi that can enter through cuts or abrasions on your feet.”
As a general rule, Clark advises travellers to bring a pair of slippers or disposable shoe covers. Or, at the very least, keep your shoes on in the bathroom.
Philips agreed, adding that 'minimising direct contact with the floor' reduces exposure and the likelihood of picking up an infection.
Dr. Gonzalo Bearman, chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at VCU Health, noted: “The best approach to cleanliness is proper handwashing and hand hygiene after the use of the aeroplane bathroom.
“Also [...]it is best to close the toilet lid prior to flushing the toilet." Doing so minimizes the risk of a 'toilet plume,' which is when microscopic particles disperse after a flush, which could potentially cause infections like norovirus.
So, it's totally fine to kick off your shoes while you're relaxing in your seat, just make sure to slip them back on before getting up - for your sake and everyone else's.