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Presented by Capital One, founding partner of "I Heart Women Sports." Hey, everybody, happy Saturday. Chuck here delivering a brand-new selects episode, but it's really not brand-new. Because, as we all know, these are reruns.
Carefully curated and selected by both Josh and I each week. This one comes to you from December 7th, 2017.
How flight attendants work?
Just got back from touring in the Midwest, and I went on quite a few flights, and made sure I gave my appreciation to all the flight attendants, 'cause they do such great work. And, I think, are often under appreciated.
“So, if you want to know what they are actually doing on their job,”
and a little bit about how you get hired, some behind-the-scenes stuff, check out this episode right now. How flight attendants work. - Welcome to Stuff You Should Know.
- Production of "I Heart Radio." - Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, with me as part of your cabin crew, as Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Building the whole thing out is our pilot, Jerry Rowland.
Captain Jerry's is what we'll call her from now on. - If you'd like to return your seat, do it's full upright position, but along with your tray table. - If you've lost your device or phone in the seat,
don't touch it, just come and get one of us. - Did that happen to you? - It's a new thing. - What? - Tell me.
- No, it's like a new thing on Delta and like the safety instructions. They actually take a little time to say, if you've lost your tablet or phone in your seat, don't adjust it, come get a flight attendant.
- What do you mean lost in the seat? What do they mean?
“- Like if you have, if you're sitting there”
and you got the butterfingers in the butt, you know, like you turn into Jerry Lewis all of a sudden, your phone slides down into the seat beside you or in between the seat next to you. - Okay.
- Your phone is in grave danger. If you adjust your seat back upright again. - Oh, like I say, get a flight attendant 'cause they now have additional skills in their repertoire to get your tablet or phone out say.
- So at some point in memo went out to these airlines, it said we're breaking cell phones 'cause people are like, "Well, maybe if I just throw a receipt up, "it'll pop out."
- Sure, it'll shoot right out. - Like I pressed rewind on life, weird. Anyway, this is stuff you should know. - I thought this is pretty interesting, actually, and it gave me even more of an appreciation
for flight attendant. - Yes. - Then I had already gained over my ears. - Yeah, because if you're one of those putsis who's mean to flight attendants, you get off the plane.
- You're a jerk. - Yep. - Shouldn't be mean to people anyway, like everybody's walking around carrying their own burden that you're totally unaware of.
And if you're mean to somebody, it usually is because you're not getting what you want right then. - Yeah. - So if everybody can just calm down and be nice to each other, that's great.
But be extra nice to the flight attendants. And if you don't agree with me now, guarantee you'll agree with us at the end of the podcast. - And even in our own article here, that was an interview with the flight attendant.
- A couple of them. - Couple of them, but one of them very, you know, one of these bats said, "Yeah, you know, back in the day, "everyone was all excited when they flew."
- Yeah, they were going someplace fun. Now everyone's crabby. - Yeah, but she makes a really great point. Why? She says it's because this is all post 9/11,
that they'll add in layers of security that they've put onto getting from your car onto the plane and increases stress so much
That you're exhausted by the time you get onto the plane.
And if flying has become a chore, a task.
- Yes. - Not a bite. - The seats have gotten way smaller. I do buy that. - The leg room's gotten smaller.
“And yeah, I think that it's just kind of become more”
of like let's get from point A to point B. - Yeah, I, taking your shoes off, taking your laptop out. It's about all the extra security. No big deal.
That's what I say. - Did I tell you I've gotten kind of on board your train about taking your shoes off on a flight? - Oh, to not do it. - Yeah, good.
- So every once in a while, it'll just be like to hell with that. I don't care. I'm taking my shoes off. I know my feet don't stink, right?
But I understand that there's people like you out there who are deeply offended by the kind of thing. So I typically do leave a mind less.
My dogs are just yapping, so loud.
I can't, yeah. - I can't ignore it. But it's pretty rare that you say this. - I think my deal with that is, is you can't count on everyone's feet to not stink, right?
And I think plenty of people, like, I don't care, that their feet stink, yeah. - Yeah, that's pretty rotten. - I just want to be comfy. - That's pretty rotten.
- But we live in something called society. (laughs) - There are rules. - But getting back to the new regulations, which is pretty much laptop out, shoes off.
I mean, you still had to go through the line just like before, you know? - Yeah, it seems, it feels different to me. - Yeah. - It does.
- Different is in more time consuming. - Yeah, much more stressful. Like, it's not an event like it was. It definitely used to be an event in a person's life to go on an airplane.
- Well, do you have a different feeling when you go on vacation, compare to work travel? - As far as the airport goes. - Yeah, and how you feel about it, the same stress? - Yes.
A lot of it, to be fair is in my head. - Yeah.
“- To me, pretty much the worst thing that can happen to you”
is missing your airplane. - I don't even want to imagine what happens when you miss your airplane. - Jimmy's like, it's not that bad. - Sure.
- In fact, she's kind of entertained, like, purposefully making his miss - Oh, your own version of cognitive behavior. - Exploratory therapy, right? - But I don't want to miss it.
So I generate my own stress in a large part, but it does seem like much more of a process than it was before. - Okay. - How about you?
- You're fine with it? - Yeah, I mean, the snow big deal. Just shoes in the laptop. - Yeah. - Two bits.
- But it does seem like, and I read this travel and leisure article about flight attendants, where the author was saying, or I think she was quoting a flight attendant
who was saying, like, we've all kind of decided as a group that we're fine with just getting on an airplane and getting to where we're going and it doesn't have to be this luxury experience.
- Right. - And as a result, the price of an airline ticket has come down dramatically. Has it paired to the golden age of flying? - Oh, yeah, but then it has gone back up
since it was pretty cheap. - Yeah, but relative to say, averaging come,
“it's, I think, much less than it wasn't say,”
like the '60s, but in the '60s, they were cutting, like cuts of meat on a cart in front of you. I'm not kidding. There was a carving station that they would move.
I'm not kidding. I've seen no other stuff. - I believe it. I think it's funny that that's the definition of fancy as a carving station.
- It really is. I mean, it is. The guy had the hat and everything. - Yeah. - I went and my extended family agreed on that.
- But it's, all of us take our shoes off while we eat our cart meat. But there used to be that, there were like piano lounges
in first class lounge, like it was an event to check.
But the fact that it's gone is because we've all said, no, we want to be able to travel for less cost. - Right. - With fewer frills. - Yeah, I just kind of want to get there.
I'm with you there. - Yeah. - If that's what you think. Or I'm with the airline industry. - Yeah, just put me on the plane and give me there.
Maybe throw a whiskey down my throat. - Sure. - And that's about all. - There you go. - Banana, maybe.
- Yeah, but it's the morning. - But the people who are going to help you get there. Banana and whiskey. - Yeah, sure. - Okay, the people who are going to help you get there,
they have, their job has changed over time. But they have not, because they are unsung heroes and have been from beginning to end. That's right, the early days of plane travel, they hired young men to take care
of the stewardship of the plane. - Cabin boys. - Yeah. - Cabin boy. - Yeah, I think that was a boat cabin, but still.
- Sure. - Still a cabin boy. - Yeah. - And that was just sort of the thing. And then this woman came along and you dug this up.
This really great. Her name was Ellen Church in 1930s, in 1930 in fact. And she was a nurse and a licensed pilot.
She had it going on.
And she said, "You know what, I have an idea Boeing Air Transport who would become United Airlines. Why don't you hire eight women to take care of you on your flight for three months and just see how that goes?"
And it went great.
“And they said, "I think we're on to something here."”
- Yeah, she actually pitched the idea
because at first, the execs were like,
"No, it's a stupid idea." I mean, this is no place for women. - Yeah. - And she said, "We'll get this." How is a man going to say that he can't fly
because he's afraid of flying? If he knows there's a woman up there flying around. And they're like, "Actually, that's pretty good psychology." So they took her up on it and it became, yeah, thank you from that moment on.
But before her, I have to say, if we're talking gender, non-specific flight attendants, - Yes. - a man had her beat by 18 years. A German man named Heinrich Hubis
who was the world's first flight attendant and he worked as Eplins, including the graph Eplin and the Hindenburg. - Really? - Did he die on the Hindenburg?
- No, he left. - Oh, wow. Very few people died on the Hindenburg.
“I think they were mostly on the ground, remember?”
- Yeah, I don't remember. - 'Cause the hydrogen burned up and the people who died were once who jumped, that's what it was. - Is that it?
- Did we do a show in that? - We've talked about it before. - Yeah. One of our many, many, many short live video series. - Oh, right, of course.
So, at any rate, Ellen Church changed the face of the flight attendant industry. And then in the '60s and '70s, of course, it was sort of a, and this is not me talking here. This is in the article.
It was the sexy stewardest phase of airline travel. - Yeah, and that was definitely the deal that you had weight limits and height limits. You had to look a certain way and they put you in just the right outfit.
And it was all about sort of, hey, get up there and look good and serve drinks. - So, and they were like, those limits you talk about? - Yeah. - I think they're still around.
There are weight limits and height limits, but they're restricted to, you can't be so short that you can't reach the overhead bins. - Yeah, they're all practical limits. - Right, you can't be so tall
that you're just bumping your head all over the place. - Yeah.
“- You have to be of an adequate size to fit into a jump seat”
that the flight attendant sit in, but that's it. Back then, it was you have to weigh like no more than 120 pounds. You have to be this high. And it had everything to do with looks and attractiveness.
- Yeah, and you're 32, so you're fired. - Yeah, that was the thing, like very early on. I think in the 50s, I think in the 1950s, they started airline started instituting age restrictions where once you got to age 32,
you were no longer eligible to be a flight attendant. You might have a job down on the ground, but you couldn't be a flight attendant more 'cause you were too old according to them. Plus also, you couldn't be married.
- Or have kids? - Right. - Yeah. It's very restrictive back in the day. - Also, maybe the most sexist industry
that's ever existed. - And of course, that's airline dependent. It's not like it was a federal regulation. - Right, yeah. - So it all depended, but you need a high school diploma
in the very least these days, but they're very competitive jobs to get. You can go into the days where you can just walk in there with a headshot and get a job as a flight attendant. A lot of people want these gigs.
And so if you have a college degree, then you definitely have a leg up these days.
- Definitely, but it's always been pretty competitive.
Supposedly, in 2006, Delta announced that they had 1,000 openings and got like 100,000 applications. - Yeah. - But it's always been really competitive because from the beginning, it was viewed
as like really glamorous in the beginning. - In the beginning, for sure. - I don't know about from the beginning. So, because it's been a really competitive career Chuck, and because the airlines were run by like,
men who were decided that they owned their flight attendants because they ran the airlines. There was in that 60s, the swinging 60s era of that sexy stewardest thing you were talking about. Like, they were a major draw for airlines.
- Sure. - In the airlines, like, advertise them as such. So I've got, I found something. This is in that travel and leisure article I found. You ready for this?
- I am. - This is gonna knock your socks off. - I was purposefully didn't send this to you because-- - You wanted my socks on the floor?
- I wanted it. - Yeah. So, national airlines in the 60s had an advertisement where they had flight attendants, Debbie, Sheryl and Karen, and they could fly me.
They also had an alternate slogan.
I'm going to fly you like you've never been flown before.
- And these are print ads?
- Yeah.
“Continental, well, Continental is just lame.”
Brand if had one, they're advertising said, does your wife know you're flying with us? - Yeah, yeah. - Pacific Southwest said you want an aisle seat because all of our flight attendants have mini skirts
and sometimes they drop stuff basically. And then get this. Eastern Airlines gave out little black books to their male passengers. - Oh wow.
- So they could get the numbers of the stewardest of the flight attendants at that time. - And then Quantis had a slogan.
I've never seen a tickle fight crazy.
You're right. It's basically the sentiment behind it. And so you've got the airlines advertising this. And then the flight attendants unions are fighting this stuff to the nails
to be treated in a dignified manner and not be fired because you weigh 122 pounds. - Right. - Which, yeah, it's just crazy. This is like this was the way that it was back then.
- Yeah. Your show for work and it's like, hey honey, get on the scale. - And when you birthday again? - Yeah. Terrible.
- You kind of went to a bill Clinton there. Sounded a little bill Clinton. I thought it sounded like W. - All right, well let's take a break then and work on our presidential accents.
And we'll come back and talk about post 9/11 flying. (upbeat music) - Hey, it's us, the Jones brothers and guess what? We have some big news.
- What's the news news? - We created our own podcast. - Oh. - Hey, Jonas. - We invented a podcast.
- Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it.
- For the first people to do podcasts.
- Pretty. - Yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. - We've been threatened. - But this one's extra special. - So how do we, how do we actually come up
with a name, hey, Jonas, guys? - I honestly don't remember.
“- I think it was on a call about what we should call it.”
And oh, we are thinking, I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band. Before Jonas Brothers, well, this is how you guys remember it going down. - Yes.
- I have a very different memory of this. - We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast. We could call in and say, hey, Jonas, and then I broke down on my little note pad. Hey, Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title.
- Oh, the podcast. - But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to hey, Jonas, on the I-Hart Radio Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen, we don't care where you hear it.
- Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. On humor me with Robert's Michael and Friends, me and hilarious guests from Bob Oden Creek to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day
and head writer, Streeter Sidel, helped an Occupella band with their between songs Banner. - Where does your group perform? - We do some retirement homes. - Those people are starving for Banner.
- Listen to humor me with Robert's Michael and Friends on the I-Hart Radio App, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. - Jacob Kingston grew up in an isolated polygamous sect. - We were God's chosen Kingdom on Earth.
- He felt destined for greatness. - So when a swaggering Armenian businessman had a pulse Jacob into an extraordinary world, he doesn't look back. - For our reason Lamborghini's right at Jets,
meeting the president of Turkey. - On Michal McFey and this is one of the most shocking criminal conspiracies I've ever come across. - When Jacob met Levant, this went to a billion dollar fraud. - But with two kings from entirely different worlds,
just how long can their empire survive? - The largest tax investigation in American history.
“- You need to tell me what you know is somebody coming after me.”
- Jacob told Levant, you're ruining my life. - Listen to Kingdom of fraud on the I-Hart Radio App, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. (dramatic music) - All right, so we did mention that after 9/11,
things of course did change. And things change in a big way for flight attendants.
They, not that they never trained on safety,
but I think the training got way more intense. - Yeah, did you see that one I sent you? - Yeah. - From I think the points guys website. - Yeah, we should go with that now, actually.
- So he has a flight attendant insider who writes quite a bit for his site. I don't remember a name, but just look up the points guy, flight attendant insider. And she goes into great detail about what it's like
to go through training and is more intense than I realized it was for sure. - Yeah, they, and this depends on the airlines, but they sort of give averages the average training
Is seven weeks, but they can't be as long as 12 weeks.
We're talking six days a week, 12 hours a day, and they call it Barbie boot camp, 'cause you don't show up in your sweats and tank top, would know makeup. - Right, it's not like you're a passenger.
- No, yeah, exactly. You're big fuzzy slippers and you're pillow from home. - No, you show up as if you are there to work a flight, so you have to be in whatever attire that they require you to be in and have your hair done
however you would do it, and just basically be game day ready.
And then they, they work you that many hours a day because that's about how many hours a day you're gonna be working. - Yeah, when you're quite attendant. - When you start working at first,
you have very little control over your own schedule. Although I get the impression you have flexibility out of the gate, but if you say I wanna work this many days a month, that's the input you have at first until you start to develop seniority.
So yeah, they exposed you to that. - Yeah. - Six days a week, 12 hours a day during training. - For many weeks. So the first thing they do is learn all the safety equipment.
They're given written tests that she said that they had to score at least a 90 on. 80, I said that really weird, didn't I? - Yeah, well, she said if it was 80, they had to retake it.
So they had to score at least a 90 to pass. - I got you. - And then practical exams, we had to score 100% on these practical tests.
And that basically means you are on a fake plane
doing the thing, and it's not like you're serving that diet coke wrong. It's mainly 90% of this training, 95% of this training. - Yeah, that's what she said.
It is equipment, safety, all that stuff. - Right, like the first stuff where they're giving
“these tests that you have to score high on,”
is here is all of the stuff you need to know about the equipment. And then there's the drills where you're showing that you know how to use it in these simulated emergencies, right? Like smokes pouring in a cabin.
What do you do? - Did you see that one picture of Emirates Airlines? It's like the big-- - I did not. - Like a third of an Emirates plane basically,
the main cabin with the slide out going into a pool inside like a hanger. And you're like, "Oh, they're gonna have to go down that slide." - Yeah, there's no way they're not going down that slide and high heels and everything too.
But they're running these drills. And apparently this is a big-- this is where most people wash out, she said, was during the drills because it's so stressful. And also, she points out that because this job
always has been and still is so competitive
that the airlines can choose to be super picky. So they will drop you from this training program. - Yeah. - Pretty easily and quickly because they know that they can find somebody else who could do it better, right?
- Yeah, so you end up with the cream of the crop in the end. - Exactly, that's a really good way to put. And then she says that really the last thing they learn and the stuff that they spend the least amount of time on is the actual customer service stuff
like pushing the beverage cart, right? Where they know exactly what to do during if sudden turbulence hits and there's a beverage cart, they are taught less how to pour that diet coke or whatever.
“- I think, like, I think I could do that.”
- The pouring the stuff, I would get so stressed out. - The whole thing, like I've seen it enough now, we travel enough for work, where if a flight attendant was like, oh my ankle, I could throw on the vest and run beverage service.
- You'd be like, step aside, I've got this. - Like I know exactly how they're doing it. I'm paying attention. - Would you splint the person's ankle first and then take over beverage service?
I would splint the ankle and then I would get up. Do you want peanuts, pretzels, or a biscoff cookie? - Yep. - Do you, what kind of drink you want? - Can't serve peanuts anymore.
- And, sure you can't. - If you're watching other day. - What? - Yeah. - You have peanuts.
- On a flight. - Yeah, I think they don't serve peanuts if someone's allergic, but I don't think they're bad peanuts. - It was my impression they have just stopped. I've been on so many flights, and they're like,
well, we've got peanuts, but you can't have them because 13 is allergic, everybody's like, - No. - Now they have almonds. - Yeah, they did have almonds on a deltaplite,
the other day that wasn't their delicious. - You have peanuts on a flight, that's like a sea lake can't. (laughing) - And then, I'm a sucker for those delta cookies, though. - Are you, I have, I have de-sensitized to them.
- Yeah. - I actually just do pretzels now. - Does biscoff cookies? - I used to be a junkie for them. - I like them.
- Yeah. - I mean, you know, it's just a little, a little bit of a little treat in the air. - We'll shortbread something or other. - It's like a gingerbread kind of bread,
but it's called speculose, which is the worst name for a dessert treat on the planet. - It says that on the package? - speculose, it's like, yeah, that's the original Dutch name for that.
- I'll tell you where the money is, Chuck. - Where's that?
“- I don't remember where I airline it is,”
but they have this Dutch treat. It's two thin, very sweet waffle cookies with a caramel like inside, right, caramel sandwich.
They say, take this thing and put it over your hot coffee
and let the steam from the coffee warm it up.
And brother, you were on cloud nine. - Who tells you that? The package. - Oh, okay.
“- The flight attendant doesn't tell you that.”
- Right. - They just go, here, read this package. - That sounds like some fancy international type of mine. - I know, it was domestic. I think it was Midwestern though.
- There's a lot of European immigrants from the 19th century, right. So that would be exerting their influence. And all the best foody ways. We got sidetracked there, we were worried.
- Oh, we were talking about how difficult the training actually is. - Yeah, and that's sort of the long and short of it. I mean, it's long, it's sort of grueling it the very end is when you learn just the, she said that you learn
that five percent of time you spend is what you end up doing 99% of the time, right.
But you just have to be so prepared for that one percent.
- Yeah. - In case something goes wrong, you can just react on the instinct. - Well, what made me feel really good was that she said the flight attendants you were flying with
are so well trained and they also have to go back for annual training every year to learn new stuff that the airlines have figured out, learn new procedures, whatever. And anytime say like an airline
deploys a new jet in its fleet, they gotta go figure that out because the safety stuff's in different places and they need to know this stuff. - And they need to be able to remember it
and act on it during an emergency. So I guess I didn't really realize this, but any flight attendant and commercial aircraft that you're flying is capable of saving your life should an emergency arise.
- Yeah, I mean, they talk about they even go through like baby birth and training. - Right. - So the next time you want to yell at them because they're saying the overhead space is full.
- Yeah.
“- Remember that that person can save your life”
if this plane starts to go down or lands in the water or something. - And it's not their fault the overhead space is full. - No, it's all the people who put their bag up and then walk to the back of the plane.
- Are you talking about the worst people on earth? - The worst people on earth. - And they took their shoes off as they were walking about. - Wow, man.
- Why did people do that? - I don't know, but I was on a flight the other day
and I've never seen overhead space more screwed up
by just a handful of people who did that. It was crazy, like toward the end, people who were sitting in like the first five rows after first class were having to go to the back of the plane. And you're just like watching them like,
oh man, you poor person as you're walking off the plane and they're just sitting there waiting to get their bag. - Yeah, it's crazy. - Yeah, I think when they started charging for bags, that's when everything went berserk
because nobody wants to check their bag except me. I don't mind now. - Yeah, it's crazy for me. - Yeah, I've never lost a bag, I don't mind, I don't have to sweat it.
I mean, if I'm just going on a work trip, I don't even have my roller bag anymore. I have my, and I have a buzz mark of the mall date. - My red ox. - Oh, really?
- Yeah, my red ox shoulder bag. - Yeah. - The thing is great and I can fit everything in there. But if I'm going on like a vacation, then I know you think it's heresy,
but I will check that bag and relax my day away. - I'm not trying to yuck you young here. - Yeah.
“- If you want to check your bag, that's fine.”
- Or gate check it, that's the good deal, 'cause you don't have to pay there. - Okay, I have no problem with gate checking it at the plane. So it's just stowed in handy manners so you just walk off and they hand it to you.
That's fine. But there are very few things that you can do that is a bigger waste of time than standing around waiting for your bag to make it to the bag carousel.
I hate doing that. Especially when you're ready for vacation to start. - Yeah, I don't mind 'cause most airports, my bag's cruising around that thing by the time I get to baggage.
- Oh yeah. - Yeah, for me. And that's just 'cause I don't know. I don't like having to mess with fighting a bag, a suitcase on a plane.
I don't like contributing to that whole process. - Sure. - Much less being a business traveler. Like you see those dudes, I have the roller bag with the big bag on top of that
and then a back-back. - You're like dude, that's like you've got three pieces of luggage. - Yep. - Need to merge them.
- All right, but this is not about just us complaining about traveling. - No, all the flight is gonna get back to the flight attendants, get back to us. - So customer service, it is the goal of the flight
in it to keep you happy as possible. But also, you know, they don't have to indulge you once you have passed the point of sobriety, right? Or just jerkness, they don't deal with that stuff anymore. Like they will stop boarding the plane
if you were drunk before you get on and have you escort it off, it's serious business now. You shouldn't get on a plane if you're loaded. - No, time was, they would get you loaded on the plane.
- No, they don't mess with that.
- But their long days, so like we said, 12 hour days,
“they are, if you're new, like you said earlier,”
they don't have a ton of control over their schedule. So you're gonna be working a lot of weekends, everybody's gonna be working some weekends. You can be doing overnight trips, spending an item in cities and that can sometimes be fun,
if you put a positive spin on it, sure, or it can be a big drag. - Yeah, but one thing that I had seen across the board from all the sources I hit for this was that you, it's up to you how much or how little you fly up to,
I think, a hundred hours a month. There's like a maximum, you can work, right? - They probably minimum, too, do you think or no? - Not that I saw. - Probably minimally to get perks, 'cause probably do.
But I get the impression that that's actually once you've done it for like six months, typically when you're hired on for an airline, you're on a probationary six month period on the perks. - Yeah, because they don't want just, you know,
everyone, they don't know you from anybody, they've known you for seven weeks, they just trained you. - Right, you like it to really like. - I want 10 buddy passes and then I'm gonna quit my job. - Exactly, well, I saw another thing too,
“apparently, buddy passes are like the worst thing”
that's ever happened to a flight attendant. - Yeah. - 'Cause everybody begs for 'em, but they are like really actually bad passes, like you're at the end of standby.
And if you're friend, if you give the buddy past your friend and they start yelling at the gate agent, you get in trouble, because it was your buddy pass those being used, you might even have your perks revoked, because your friend was a jerk to the gate attendant,
and everybody's always asking you for 'em.
So a lot of people don't even touch the buddy past perk. - That's like if you're a country club member, you're responsible for the behavior of your guests. - Right, now. - Not that I would know.
- There are other perks, you know, now, you've seen Katie check. - Yeah, but I've never liked the long-term country club. - There are other perks where like family members, immediate family members, sometimes extended family members,
spouses, they get the same perks you do, which very frequently is like you just pay taxes on the ticket and you fly for free. Though that's different, like all flight attendants take advantage of that.
Some of 'em will hop on over to Europe or something for, you know, lunch, 100 bucks. - Yeah, maybe if that in tax? - Yeah, well, buddy past is used to be a lot easier when they didn't oversell all the flights.
You know, like I used to have friends back in the day, I'd get a buddy past, fly no problem. - Right. - But now you're right, it's, you're in a bad position.
“- Yeah, you are, do you remember flights”
where like entire rows would be empty? - It would be like, well, the flight was scheduled so we have to stick to it. - It's strange now, what a day. - Yeah, so you're gonna be working 75 to 85 hours a month
generally, but like you said, I guess you can't go over that 100 mark. And interestingly too, another thing you get trained for is very sadly human trafficking these days. They will fly kidnapped people right in front of people's faces.
And so flight attendants now are trained to just spot this kind of activity, which can mean like an adult who doesn't really understand about the final destination. That's a bad sign, or if it's like an adult traveler
with a minor and they just, it definitely looks like a little more than parental behavior going on. Like, don't get up and go to the bathroom that kind of thing. - Apparently that's how it started. There was a man who caught the suspicion
of a flight attendant named Sandra Fierini. She worked for American Airlines. She noticed that like a late 18 year old teenager, aged guy who was head and infant, that still had the umbilical cord attached.
And like a bottle of milk and his pocket, a couple of diapers, stops in his pocket. There's other pocket. So like this baby was stolen or bought or something. And she started looking into it
and found out that there was actually a big deal and teamed up with a woman named Deborah Sigmund who founded Innocence at Risk. And they kind of started this program, more and now if you're a flight attendant,
when things are trained for, is to recognize human trafficking. And they actually, a bunch of flight attendants volunteered at the last Super Bowl to look for human trafficking because apparently the Super Bowl is like also
the Super Bowl of prostitution and human trafficking in the world every year. So flight attendants went to the Super Bowl and volunteered to kind of like keep tabs on things
and call out people they thought were amazing.
- Human trafficking. - You mean the big game? - Yeah, somebody wrote in and said, you can call it Super Bowl. - Sure.
- You can't do anything. - Yeah, you can't advertise anything using those words. - Right. - I don't think. - We can't sell our Super Bowl Bible heads
That we can then have a box full of.
- It's too bad. - It was a poor investment. - Should we take our final break here? - Yeah. - All right, let's do that.
We'll talk a little bit more about some of the perks and drawbacks right after this. (upbeat music) (dramatic music) - Hey, it's us, the Jonas Brothers,
and guess what, we have some big news. - What's the news, dude? - This news. - We created our own podcast. - Oh.
- Hey, Jonas, we invented a podcast. - Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it.
- First people to do podcast.
- Pretty. - Yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. - We're starting a trend. - But this one's extra special. - So how do we, how do we actually come up
with a name, hey, Jonas, guys? - I honestly don't remember.
“I think it was on a call about what we should call it.”
And oh, we were thinking, I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band. Before Jonas Brothers. - Mm-hmm. - Well, this is how you guys remember it going down.
- Yes. - I have a very different memory of this. - We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast. We put the call in and say, hey, Jonas,
and then I broke down in my little note pad.
Hey, Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title.
- Oh, fuck that. - But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to hey, Jonas, on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen, we don't care where you hear it.
- Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite on humor me with Robert's Michael and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Oden Creek to David Letterman help make you funnier this week, my guest. SNL's Mikey Day and Headwriters, Streeter Side L.
Help an Occupel a band with their Between Songs Banner. - Where does your group perform? - We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. - Wasn't a humor me with Robert's Michael and friends
on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. - Jacob Kingston grew up in an isolated polygamous sect. - We were God's chosen kingdom on earth. - He felt destined for greatness.
- So when a swaggering Armenian businessman had a pulse Jacob into an extraordinary world, he doesn't look back. - For our reason Lamborghini's right at Jets, meeting the president of Turkey.
- Our Michal McPhee and this is one of the most shocking criminal conspiracies I've ever come across.
- When Jacob met Levant, this went to a billion dollar fraud.
- But with two kings from entirely different worlds, just how long can their empire survive? - The largest tax investigation in American history.
“- You need to tell me what you know is somebody coming after me.”
- Which I can tell Levant, you're ruining my life. - Listen to kingdom of fraud on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. - All right, let's talk about pay. - Baby, you don't make a ton of money.
I think starting salaries in the mid-30s. - Oh no, for a flight attendant. - That's no, no. Starting salary can be like 18. - Oh really?
- The median in 2012 or 13 or 14 was 37, the median. - Yeah. - That's like, that's the middle. - That's not much, you know? - That's why it's such an attractive job
for people who are just looking for extra money. - Right. - If you're a parent and you have so much control over your schedule once you start to get some seniority, it's a great, great way to spend your money.
If you're a soap opera star, it's a great, great extra job. Did you see that? - Yeah, what was her name?
“- Kate Linder, who plays Esther Valentine”
on the Young and the Restless. - Who knew? She's a flight attendant as well. - For like 32 years. - Yeah.
- And she's done them both for about the same amount of time. - Yeah. - And she does it like every week. - Yeah, and she says, it helps keep her grounded, no pun intended.
- Yeah, she didn't say the no pun intended part. - Yeah, but, I mean, she gets those perks. She gets to fly to Europe for lunch if you want. - Right. - And act on soaps.
- Right. - So good for her. - And that's not to say that the median, I mean, obviously, that's the middle amount, but it goes much higher than that. And it all has to do, all perks, all pay,
all benefits, all that stuff. The flight attendant profession is all about seniority. - Oh, sure. - And there are plenty of flight attendants out there who are career flight attendants and, you know,
like Kate Linder, she's been doing it for 32 years. There's another woman named Candy Bruton who was a 43-year veteran of flight attendant.
- Yeah.
- Like, you can make a long, happy career out of it. Now that they've taken that age restriction off. - Yeah, $21 in 23 cents a few years ago,
an hour was the rate for a first-year attendant.
“So, plus $20 an hour, but here's the thing,”
and this is something that I bet 95% of human beings don't realize. When you were sitting on that plane, those doors are open and they're getting you your first class drinks, or they're helping you put your bags
away, and you're complaining 'cause you don't have a pillow in coach, they're doing that for almost free, because the only hours that they get paid for at that rate are flight hours. - Yeah, when it says the boarding doors now closed,
the clock just started for them. Never knew that. - No, I didn't either. They get something like depending on the airline, maybe $1.50 to $1.95 for the pre-the boarding stuff,
the pre- while the door is open, stuff, I guess is what you call it. - Yeah, so like next time you're sitting on the tarmac and you're delayed for two hours, and you're super grumpy, think about that flight attendant who is getting paid
almost nothing to be dealing with how grumpy you are.
- The boarding doors closed, they would be getting paid, right? Now, they said in here, if flight delays, like flight time is only a matter. - I thought it was once the door is closed, so if the doors closed and you go out to the runway
and you're just sitting there on the runway, they would be getting paid. - I thought. - That's not what it said. - Somebody let us know.
- 'Cause it said in the article, if next time you're on a big flight delay, think about the fact that they're not making any money. - I know, and that's probably why the airline put it in there because can you imagine how much money they would have
to pay in flight attendants for flight delays? - Yeah, but it's not like the flight attendants are just like, "Pfft, I'm off the clock. "Don't bother me. "Once we get into the air, you can bother me."
You don't hear that, you know?
So they should be paying them for that. - Hey, I agree, you know?
“I think we should pay in together and serve the social movement here.”
- I wonder why they should tip flight attendants too. - Yeah, that's not a thing. - They should stand, you know, the end when they stand there and say, "Good day," and I hope you enjoyed your flight. They should be holding a jar as far as I'm concerned.
- It's shaking it. - Yeah, throw far bucks in there on your way out. - Bye-bye. - I think they'd be great. - You remember Tina Mucklow?
- Thank you for the DB Cooper Heist? - Yeah. - He tried to give her $10,000 and she said, "No tipping allowed." - That's right.
- What a hero. - And quite often flight attendants are the heroes on many flights, whether it is dealing with literally a terrorist and trying to manage that situation bravely
or God forbid some sort of incident in the air with, you know, with the plane itself. But at the very least, those jerks on planes that think they can just talk to people however they want.
- Yeah. - They got to put up with a lot in a very cramped space. I'm very early on in flight attendant history. I don't know if we said or not. You said that Ellen Church was a registered nurse,
but that was par for the course for early flight attendants. They had to be registered nurses. - Makes sense. - There was one named Nellie Granger
who was a TWA flight attendant and she was on a flight, go into Pittsburgh, I believe, in 1936 and it crashed. And she pulled a couple of passengers to safety and made it down the mountain to get help.
And went back up with the rescuers to help minister to the two injury passengers whose lives she saved. - Did she get 30 cents an hour? - She got a trip to this plane with her aunt.
- That's nice. - TWA, yeah. - I got a couple more things, sure. - There's some crazy stuff that flight attendants have seen. The one that gets me though is dead bodies on planes
that are purposefully brought onto planes. Not people who die, apparently Singapore Airlines has what's called a corpse closet on their planes to sto a passenger who might die mid-air. - That's nice.
- They're in the minority there. I think there might be peculiar with that. But sometimes because shipping a body is very expensive, it can run into the thousands and thousands of dollars. Some people say, well, it'd be cheaper
if I just bought a plane ticket or put my mother in a garment bag and just smuggled her body. I'm bored and took her where she's gonna be buried myself. - Yeah. - That a guy got caught doing that Miami.
There was in this mental floss article, there was the person who's interviewed said her roommate found a mother and a daughter trying to smuggle the dead father onto a flight, just in a wheelchair and said that he had the flu, but he was clearly dead and they had to stop
the plane mid-flight. - Wow. Maybe he did have the flu. - No, he was dead.
“- No, I mean, maybe that's how I'd done.”
- Oh, maybe he previously had the flu, yeah. - It could have been like, it goes in the kernel of truth to what we just said. - That's it.
- Oh, and don't know where to die at Coke
'cause apparently it takes the longest to stop fizzing on a trolley, okay? That's science.
“If you want to know more about flight attendants,”
just chat up a flight attend and I'm sure they'd love to tell you some great stories. And in the meantime, it's time for this room out. (bell ringing) - I'm gonna call this PSA about the flu,
because we had someone Courtney Harmouth, who was a sconey, who says this.
Hey guys, wanna basically give you a PSA
about how dangerous the flu can be in 2012. Was a healthy high school freshman, was suddenly stricken with a horrible digestive distress, a chills fever coughing after a week or so. My parents took me to the GP,
and I was told to go to the hospital for observation and get an IV. What was supposed to be one night turned into a month. I'd contracted the swine flu. - Oh my gosh.
- That first night, my vitals went crazy and I ended up having to be kept in my local hospital for two weeks during my stay at developed pneumonia. As a complication, soon after that, fluid began to fill my lungs
“and I had to be helicopter to a larger hospital in Madison.”
She said being in the helicopter was pretty sweet though. Really? - Yeah, even though, you know. - I was thinking how the helicopter would not be comfortable. - I think she's a bright side person.
- Okay. - For about 20 minutes, I was only taking in about 30% oxygen. My parents were told I could have brain damage or may even die. On my arrival to the larger hospital,
I was immediately put to a medically induced coma for 11 days. - Oh my gosh.
- I was finally taken out of my coma.
I had atrophied in way to measly 95 pounds. At 12 years old, I had to relearn how to walk right and use basic motor skills. I am extremely lucky, I am completely recovered from the ordeal.
Did not suffer any long-term health effects. And now it's 23 years old. I thankfully had not had the flu sense. It's held us to everyone to say, please get vaccinated against the flu.
The flu vaccine doesn't just protect you, but also your kids, parents, friends, and co-workers. Really love your show. I want to thank you for doing such a great job.
“About important and sometimes hilarious topics”
that is our Wisconsinite fan, Courtney Harmuth. - Thanks a lot, Courtney. Glad you made it through that one. That was, I am pretty scary. - Yeah, we said the flu could be dangerous,
so you haven't. Courtney just proved it, everybody. If you want to tell us a great story
that is harrowing and amazing, we want to hear it.
Or if you have a good flight attendants story, that's going to you. You can send us an email to stuffpodcast. At IHeartRadio.com. - Stuff you should know is a production
of IHeartRadio. For more podcasts, my heart radio, visit the IHeartRadio app. Apple podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
- Hey guys, it's us and the Jonas Brothers, I'm Joe. - I'm Kevin. - And I'm Nick and guess what? - We created our own podcast called, "Hey Jonas." - We invented a podcast.
- Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to our people to do podcasts. - We get to ask other people questions 'cause we're sick and tired of being an ask questions. - Well, sick and tired just a strong way to put it,
but you know, tired and sick, tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Just listen, we don't care where you hear it. - Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy,
not quite on humor me with Robert Smigle and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Oden Creek to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and Head Writer, Streeter Side L helped an aquapella band
with their between songs banter. - Where does your group perform? - We do some retirement homes. - Those people are starving for banter. - Listen to humor me with Robert Smigle and friends
on the IHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. - Winning on Clay is an art. The rallies are relentless. And at the French Open, only the toughest survive.
I know, I competed there for decades. Join me, Renee Stubbs, on the Renee Stubbs tennis podcast, for no nonsense breakdowns of the biggest matches. The toughest players and the moment said to find Roland Garros. - Gentian Winner, she's an outsider to win the French ring.
- And she likes Clay. - Listen, Leonard Rebakina is arguably the best player in the world right now. - And actually, we're not any surface. - Listen to the Renee Stubbs tennis podcast
on the IHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. - Presented by Capital One, founding partner of IHeartWomenSports. This isn't IHeartPutcast.
(upbeat music) - Guarantee Human.
