JetBlue will extend through the 4 July holiday its commitment to seat distancing by blocking middle seats in rows where parties are not traveling together. The policy, part of the airline’s multi-layered “Safety from the Ground Up” program, comes as the airline is also set to roll out temperature monitoring for its flight and in-flight crewmembers and electrostatic aircraft fogging in June.
“We are pleased to extend our efforts to keep seats free and help everyone onboard spread out.”
“As communities start to reopen and with summer travel kicking off this weekend, more people are beginning to fly and we want them to feel safe on JetBlue,” said Joanna Geraghty, president and chief operating officer, JetBlue. “Our program layers together a series of protections throughout the entire travel journey, which work together to help keep everyone safe and well.”
JetBlue’s program focused on four focus areas: healthy crewmembers; clean air and surfaces; more space, fewer touchpoints; and travel flexibility.
As part of its “more space, fewer touchpoints” focus, middle seats will be blocked on its Airbus aircraft, and on its smaller Embraer 190 aircraft, JetBlue will block aisle seats. The airline does allow customers traveling together to sit in middle and aisle seats. JetBlue will keep the seat distancing program in place through at least July 6.
Steps to ensure the health and safety of JetBlue’s 23,000 crewmembers include conducting temperature checks for our pilots and in-flight crewmembers (rolling out first week in June); providing disinfectant kits for pilot use on the flight deck, and requiring face coverings for all crewmembers while boarding, in flight, and when physical distancing cannot be maintained
JetBlue is ensuring the use of disinfectant approved to kill coronavirus and maintaining healthy air onboard its aircraft. This includes increasing aircraft cleaning before every flight and overnight, including surfaces that are touched most like tray tables; using electrostatic sprayers to fog the inside of its aircraft (rolling out soon), and filtering cabin air through hospital-grade HEPA air filters with cabin air completely changing about every three minutes.
To increase physical distancing and to decrease touchpoints, JetBlue is requiring face coverings for all customers during check-in, boarding and in-flight; providing touchless check-in and boarding experiences using the JetBlue mobile app and self-boarding gates for many of its flights; implementing a back-to-front boarding process for most customers to minimise passing in the aisle; adjusting on board service including pre-sealed snack and beverage bags in Core, and pre-packaged fresh meals in Mint, and encouraging the use of personal device as a remote for seatback screens on select planes.
