AD Aerospace signs deal to film Boeing's first class passengers
“Mini Suites” block flight attendants’s view of the well-heeled; camera will turn on during takeoff and landing only, companies say; a missed opportunity?
Airplane cabins: the final frontier for CCTV and video analytics. The latest evidence comes from Boeing, which announced this week that it had selected Warrington, England-based AD Aerospace to supply a camera system for its 777 jetliner. The move is a response to the growth of “Mini Suites” in first class cabins which, the company says, “while offering an outstanding level of comfort for passengers, is making direct line of sight visual contact increasingly difficult” for flight attendants. When the AD system is installed, cameras installed in the cabin ceiling will transmit footage to an LCD monitor visible from the crew seating area. As for privacy concerns, the companies point out that the camera and monitor are active only during takeoff and landing. We wonder one thing, though: wouldn’t it be a good idea, seeing as the cameras are already there, to permit the flight crew to activate the cameras under dramatic conditions? Whether it was a terrorist attack or a drunk conventioneer, surely having a video record would have some value.
