Rick Raw: Proof That Irish Airline CEO Drank Too Much Guinness by Threatening to Install Pay Toilets in Their Aircraft

By Rick Grant Commentary rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

Ryanair Irish Airline’s CEO, Michael O’Leary suggested that another way to raise money for the cash strapped airline was to install pay toilets on their planes, charging a pound (about $1.40) for a pee. With other airlines looking for ways to nickel and dime passengers, such as charging for luggage, pillows, nuts, and movies, this idea comes from an Irish idiot who has spent too many nights at the pub.

It’s proof that this dumb-ass has been drinking too much Guinness. Is there any end to the pettiness of these airline CEOs? Yeah, the once friendly skies turned sinister after 9/11 and the airlines lost a pile of money during the two years after the attack when public nervousness over flying made air travel scary. Today, the airline industry is desperate to pull out of operating in the red.

So now passengers on Ryanair have to make sure that they are carrying plenty of pound notes. What if you forgot to carry cash. Uh-oh, the smell of urine would get unbearable. Come on, this jerk can’t be serious? This brazen declaration may have been a ploy for publicity, but O’Leary claims he is serious. O’Leary rationalized the new charge by saying that across Europe, trains have pay toilets.

During the airlines’ golden years 1950s-1980s, airlines competed to offer luxury amenities on flights. Since flying during that era was relatively expensive, it attracted the an affluent clientele. People dressed up to fly and expected first class service and gourmet food. Times changed and commercial flying became affordable to most anyone but customer service disappeared.

Then the discount airlines appeared in the early 1980s such as People Airline. Flying People was more like taking a bus. A flight attendant would roll a cash register cart down the aisle to collect the ticket money. Once I flew People and remember a woman didn’t have the money, so she was handcuffed to her seat by a flight attendant, and taken from the plane by Air Marshalls when we landed.

By the late 1980s, the amenities of yesteryear were gone and flying became a hassle. After 9/11/2001, flying on commercial airlines was intolerable. After the shoe bomber was foiled, everyone had to remove their shoes, belts, and a new X-ray machine was installed. It exposes passengers to the embarrassment of having their naked bodies seen by screeners.

Today, all passengers are treated like potential terrorists. God help you if you look Mid-eastern or are a Muslim wearing traditional garb. Ironically, security has never been that effective despite the precautions. Every time there are tests of airline security, they fail when a guy with a fake bomb gets through the screening process.

So what do the airline CEOs do, they turn into petty little penny-pinchers who want to charge passengers for every little thing. If flying wasn’t stressful enough, now passengers have to dig into their wallets every step through the airport. And if Michael O’Leary gets his way, passengers will have to pay to use the toilet. Could the airlines have made flying more undesirable? Man, forget flying, I’m driving.