"De plane! De plane!"
Posted on 02/18/2016 9:38:32 AM PST by PROCON
Is 162 centimetres metres (five feet three inches) too short for an aircraft pilot? Lufthansa regulations say that their crew must be at least 165 centimetres tall - but one applicant has now dragged them to Germany's highest labour court for discrimination.
The young woman got through the first few rounds of the extremely tough application process for a coveted pilot position at Europe's biggest airline.
Candidates must speak fluent English and German, be physically fit and mentally dependable.
No standard minimum height
And - one more thing - pilots must be between 165 and 198 centimetres tall.
"That's to ensure that a pilot is able to use all the control elements in the cockpit in any situation without difficulty," Lufthansa spokesman Helmut Tolksdorf said.
But Lufthansa is stricter than many other airlines - even some of its own subsidiaries.
At Swiss - a Lufthansa subsidiary - the rules set a minimum height of 160 centimetres. Air Berlin has no minimum height, and a spokeswoman said that adjustable cockpit seats mean that pilots' size isn't an issue.
Even the Luftwaffe (German air force) sets a minimum height for pilots of just 155 centimetres (five feet).
Lengthy legal battle
Judges at the state labour court in Cologne agreed with the young plaintiff in a 2014 ruling, saying that she had been disadvantaged because of her sex.
With 44 percent of German women over 20 years old measuring up at less than 165 centimetres - compared with three percent of men - the Lufthansa rule was unfair to women, they said.
But they did not grant the applicant any damages in compensation.
Now she has brought her case to the federal labour court in Erfurt, Thuringia, where she claims €15,000 in damages and €120,000 in compensation for her truncated career opportunities.
The judges will have a tricky case to consider, as it is legal under German law for some professions to discriminate.
Navy sailors and police officers have to meet certain height requirements too - although these vary between different federal states, and some states have different minimums for men and women.
But a decision in the wannabe pilot's favour could see those restrictions tumble as well, legal experts say.
1. Booster seat?
2. Redesign the whole cockpit to accommodate the shorties?
3. Shut-up and make me a sammich?
"De plane! De plane!"
They have to be able to see over the dashboard. LOL
I guess it doesn’t matter if it is unfair to short men.
3. Shut-up and make me a sammich?
And bring me a cold beer.
My wife is a pilot at a major airline.... facts are you do have to be able to fully manipulate those rudder pedals... height matters... BTW she is 5’4”...
Interestingly over the years we have met a few men that did not qualify for the majors due to height issues... is just reality
There is a strength issue as well. Short people are generally weaker than the normal.(Yes, kiddies I know not all short people are weaker.) I remember reading some where that many aircraft crashes are a result of hydraulic failures which would then require greater strength to pilot the plane.
And what if the woman is a transgendered he/she/it of color?
Can you say D-i-s-c-r-i-m-i-n-a-t-i-o-n?
Upcoming Nascar driver Rico Abreau is 52 inches tall, but of course the cars are modified to accomodate him.
It sounds like she was disqualified due to her height, not her gender. As long as they do not hire men, who are the same height as she is (or shorter), it would not seem like she has much of a case.
That said, if this was the USA, the government and/or ACLU would probably require the airlines to create a new cockpit that would work for her, and mandate that it be transplanted onto all aircraft owned by the particular airline.
The rejects are sent to Germanwings.
and yes...wife with the full uniform on... hat and stripes, shoes, grey hair, wrinkles etc.. older people still think she is flight attendant...its funny to see it go down..hand her trash on the way out etc... or ask why a flight attendant is in the “cockpit” hahaaaa have to laugh..
Why was she allowed in the process in the first place? Did she shrink somewhere along the way?
Not only do that discriminate against people who can’t easily reach the controls but they discriminate against blind people too. So sad.
We must stop judging opportunity by outcomes. If a height is essential for a job then anyone, woman or not, who isn’t that height should move along to another job. It is not critical to the running of the world to have men and women in every single job.
What a tragedy that was.
The great jazz pianist Erroll Garner for years performed sitting on a Manhattan Yellow Pages
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