Window Seat Showdown: Passengers Lose Control As Crew Lock Shades Mid-Flight - View from the Wing

by Gary Leff on September 28, 2024

Reader Yolanda shared her experience on a recent Boeing 787 transatlantic flight. Cabin crew kept the windows locked in the dimmed position beginning after takeoff, and up until final approach to London Heathrow.

She is a fearful flyer in turbulence, and asked flight attendants to let her open her window. She was told they would, but didn’t, and believes that window seat passengers should have control of the window. She’ll even choose planes with manual window shades in the future, so she doesn’t give up control of them to flight attendants. She was just too scared when turbulence hit.

Now, I’ve been barked at by cabin crew for opening my window shade during turbulence on a long flight, just appreciating a bit of situational awareness. This is something that’s happened most often with European cabin crew while how U.S. flight attendants feel about this varies widely.

The latest generation of aircraft have electronic window shades, that you control with the push of a button instead of sliding up and down, flight crew can control them all too.

They can dim everyone’s shades in the cabin. They can also lock the shades up or down – up for takeoff and landing, because situational awareness matters in case you need to evacuate the aircraft, and down for darkness to promote sleep (and, perhaps, to promote fewer passengers bothering them).

People pay for window seats to look out the window. There are magical sights up in the clouds, they want to appreciate the approach to their destination, or maybe look down at the ice around Greenland. Other passengers want to sleep. And like so many things in a plane, preferences come into conflict.

On a night flight, open or closed window shades don’t much matter when you take off – it’s dark outside, and cabin lights are usually on for meal service. But as the flight goes on and service stops, people begin to sleep. And for the hours as you approach you destination it may be light out. You don’t want the sun shining into the cabin while everyone’s still trying to get sleep. This is especially important on short east coast transatlantics where there’s not much time for sleeping anyway.

On a day flight, such as Westbound from Europe to the U.S., it’ll be light out for most of the flight. Some passengers will try to nap, since they’ll be landing with a six or nine hour time change and struggling to stay up and adjust to local time when they arrive (plus, for some, it just passes the time better).

Some people sleep, some don’t, and it’s… day time. So I think the etiquette is different here.

I like an open window as much as possible, unless the sun is shining through the window so brightly that it interferes with screens and sleep of others. I don’t like flight attendants who require window shades to be closed on daytime flights from Europe to the U.S. since I rarely sleep on those flights and I find them less draining when I have light. But there’s not a lot I can do on a Boeing 787 when they control the shades, or when crew come around scolding passengers who open their windows.

Ultimately, the person at the window should have control of the shade. If you’re in the window seat, you decide the position the shade is in. However flight attendant direction trumps whether they’re being reasonable or not. If you’re at the window, be considerate and avoid blinding light and accommodate your neighbors. If someone asks you to put the window shade down (or up) consider doing as they ask if they have a strong preference and you do not. And in summertime at warm weather destinations close the shades before getting off the plane to help keep the aircraft cool for the next group of passengers during boarding.

To expand a bit, there are (6) principles of airplane window shades:

In Yolanda’s case, and for fearful flyers who want control over the window shade for help self-regulating, it seems like paying attention to aircraft type makes good sense.

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