0:00

This is a rooster teeth

0:02

production.

0:07

That captain has turned on the no smoking

0:10

sign. Gone is the golden age travel

0:12

where passengers could request cigars by a helpful

0:14

flight attendant who would also provide a light.

0:17

Gears up, light up was a common term in the

0:19

era when smoking in confined spaces

0:21

like elevators was commonplace. The first

0:23

half of the twentieth century was covered in tobacco

0:25

field haze of smokers getting their nicotine

0:28

fix at will while sharing their vice with non smokers

0:30

who were unfortunate enough to be captured

0:32

confined spaces in Haley's secondhand fumes.

0:35

These days, airline passengers rarely witness the

0:37

sight of the ashtray embedded in the

0:39

arb of their seat as its sealed shut

0:41

as a relic of this bygone era of smoke

0:44

filled skies. Passengers these days

0:46

who decide to light up in flight are more likely to

0:48

face fines and handcuffs instead of a smiling

0:50

attendant passing out matches. What

0:52

happened to change the habits of in flight smoking and shifted

0:54

the balance to cater to the non smoking crowd of airline

0:57

passengers worldwide? Find out on this

0:59

episode of Black Box Down. Hello,

1:06

everyone. Welcome to Black Box Down. It's Gus and

1:08

Chris. Hello, Chris. Hi. We're

1:10

here with a supplemental

1:11

episode. Everything you ever wanted to know about

1:13

spoken on an airplane, but we're afraid

1:15

to ask. I've always

1:17

wanted to ask.

1:19

Before we really dive into it, I I feel like I

1:22

should mention. I had a cold last week

1:24

and I lost my voice. You said good?

1:25

No. Thank you. It started coming back. And

1:27

then at work, we played a video game yesterday that

1:29

made me scream a lot. And it's kinda

1:31

it's kinda borderline now. So if

1:33

I sound a little strange. That's what

1:35

it is. You can blame a a video game called Pico

1:38

Park. That's AII

1:40

know you've played Pico Park. I know.

1:42

I know you know what that game's how how frustrating

1:45

that game could be. But that's neither here nor

1:47

there. We're gonna talk all about smoking

1:49

today before we dive into it.

1:51

Of course, wanna remind you to give

1:54

us a follow at black box down pod on

1:56

Facebook,

1:56

Instagram, Twitter. I don't know what we'll able to

1:58

post for this episode. Maybe if we could think is

2:00

something to post. We'll find something to post. Yeah.

2:02

Oh, I just wanna shout out for anyone

2:05

who is a a first class supporter

2:08

of the show or you You

2:10

can do that, like, box down pod dot com

2:12

or or roof seat first. We

2:14

have a new first class episode

2:16

that we're gonna record right after

2:18

this. So heads up for that.

2:20

They'll be coming out shortly, and thank you for your

2:22

support. Yeah. We appreciate it. And, of course, you

2:24

Cant also directly support and get that directly

2:27

in Apple Cant and Spotify as well, I believe.

2:29

Yeah. So I'm a

2:32

little older than you, Chris. So I'm gonna

2:34

presume that you have never smoked on a

2:35

plane. You're not a smoker to begin

2:38

with. No. I've never smoked on a plane.

2:41

There's lots of things. I've never

2:43

smoked it. You've probably never even

2:45

seen someone smoking on a plane. Right? Not

2:47

that not from memory. It may be when

2:49

I was a

2:49

kid, There might have been

2:51

some time. I'm not sure, but I I don't have any

2:53

memory people smoking on a plane. I didn't

2:56

really start traveling until I was older. I

2:58

grew up in a really small town and -- Mhmm. --

3:00

so I I never even though I'm little older than

3:02

you, I don't think I ever saw anyone smoke on

3:04

a plane. But of course, I've seen I'm

3:06

sure you've seen it and there's ashtray's on the

3:08

plane. Yeah. Like, there's there's still remnants. Some

3:10

of the planes that you still fly in are old enough where

3:12

people probably smoked in them at one point back in

3:14

the day. But, like, how does that happen? Right? How

3:16

we'd talk all about how that transition happened

3:19

and how we ended up where we are today.

3:21

Yeah. So right

3:23

off the bat, III gotta say

3:26

Until nineteen seventy one, most

3:28

airlines allowed unrestricted smoking both

3:30

in the cabin and on the flight deck. So

3:33

what happened actually was it was flight attendants who were

3:35

led by an activist named Patty Young, who

3:37

were herself was an American Airlines flight attendant,

3:39

began fighting for the right to work in a tobacco

3:42

free environment and that movement started in the

3:44

summer of nineteen sixty nine. The

3:47

flight attendant sought and they obtained assistance

3:49

from health advocates to promote their

3:51

fight to breathe clean air in airline

3:53

cabins. And it was these

3:56

efforts that kind of built that

3:58

momentum to start that

4:00

advocacy for smoke free flights everywhere.

4:03

And that was what year did you say

4:05

nineteen? They started at the summer of sixty nine.

4:07

Summer sixty nine. And so Previously

4:10

cigarettes and smoking was just allowed in

4:12

every commercial

4:13

flight? Oh, yeah. Well, but the the

4:15

the the remember, the the advocacy

4:18

started in sixty nine. The restriction

4:20

started in nineteen seventy

4:21

one. So up to that point, it was yeah.

4:24

You smoke smoke them if you got them.

4:26

So, like, yeah, I guess I was wondering is, like, if there was

4:28

a transition period whenever they first started

4:31

letting people onto planes,

4:33

like, commercially to,

4:36

like, early early days where it was, like,

4:38

a new thing. And then at some point, they're, like, oh, yeah. We

4:40

need to we need to have let people smoke

4:42

cigarettes if we wanna you

4:43

know. If I were to guess when it focused, you

4:45

know, aviation come you know,

4:48

passenger aviation started in the early nineteen

4:50

hundreds, I'm gonna bet they didn't even give

4:52

it a second thought at first. It was like, wouldn't

4:54

people smoke on the plane? You know, it was just crazy.

4:56

You know, to smoke, you know? Yeah. And

4:59

I think as time went on, people really started thinking

5:02

about it and, you know, creating changes.

5:04

And even the process of I I don't

5:06

know how much you've thought about this, but going

5:08

from you could smoke on a plane to

5:10

No one smoke on the plane. That was a

5:12

long process, Chris. There

5:14

were many steps involved to get there.

5:17

And we're gonna talk about all of that here

5:19

in this episode. But the

5:22

first airline to create a non smoking

5:24

section was United

5:26

Airlines in nineteen seventy one. And

5:30

they were followed by an airline called

5:32

and I'm gonna say this wrong. I don't know how to say

5:34

it. Aurigny Air Services who

5:36

banned smoking entirely in nineteen

5:39

seventy seven. I had to do some digging.

5:41

I didn't know who Aurigney

5:43

Air Services was or or they were

5:45

based out of anything. It's an airline

5:48

that's based out of the Channel Islands.

5:50

And I read that, and I thought, I don't know what that

5:52

means either. It's

5:57

the English channel. It's -- Okay. -- and

5:59

the islands off the coast of France.

6:01

Between France and England are specifically kind of off the

6:03

coast of Normandy. So

6:05

it was a small relatively small airline,

6:07

but they've been smoking entirely in nineteen seventy

6:10

seven. So they they get the

6:12

the the footnote in history as being the first airline

6:14

to entirely ban smoking. But

6:16

that's that's early. Nineteen eighty seven.

6:19

That is early. That's earlier than I would have

6:21

thought. Yeah. Then for

6:23

comparison -- Uh-huh. -- in nineteen ninety

6:25

four, Delta became the first US airline

6:28

to bed smoking on all lights worldwide. Wow.

6:30

So there was a big gap there. See,

6:33

that's actually later than I

6:34

thought. I was thinking it was

6:37

We might have talked about this at some point, but

6:39

I was thinking it was, like, late eighties, early

6:41

nineties, like but

6:43

more towards late eighties that they banned

6:45

it, but I don't know. And Remember, Delta was

6:47

the first. So that's There were still

6:50

there were still others going on at

6:52

that point. And I decided to do, like,

6:54

cross reference some figures here

6:57

So I looked up on the American Lung Organization's

7:00

website, and in nineteen

7:02

seventy, thirty seven point four

7:04

percent of Americans smoked. And

7:07

that number has fallen. The most recent data

7:09

they had available online was for twenty

7:11

eighteen, and that number had fallen down to thirteen

7:13

point seven percent. That's it. That's pretty

7:15

big

7:16

decrease. I mean, it's not it's not

7:18

surprising, but Yeah. Because I started wondering,

7:20

you know, how many people were because I you

7:22

know, like, how many people were smoking on the plane? Was it the majority

7:25

people who were smoking in the minority, like, a small number

7:27

of people who weren't smoking? Like, I was trying to Yeah.

7:29

Just, like, figure it out what it looked like in

7:31

my

7:31

head. So those are the numbers I came up with. It

7:33

is interesting though. What

7:36

was that thirty something percent?

7:38

What year was

7:39

that?

7:39

Thirty seven point four percent in nineteen seventy.

7:41

So it's interesting that

7:44

before, like, the first discussion

7:46

about having a non smoking section, still

7:49

it was still, like, a third of the population.

7:51

So there was, like, two thirds of the population putting

7:54

up with smoke. Secondhand

7:56

smoke, no matter what if they wanted

7:58

to fly on a plane without any option.

8:01

It's it's interesting that that it's

8:03

that discrepancy of, you know,

8:05

it's not even the

8:06

majority. I think it seems

8:08

strange to us now because of the the the rules

8:10

we have in the world we live in. But I think at the time

8:12

it was just something that was commonplace. Like I

8:14

think about when I was younger and I would go out to

8:17

bars in downtown Austin before there was

8:19

a smoking ban

8:19

and, you know, any people could just smoke in

8:21

bars, like, I wasn't a smoker,

8:24

but, like, I never gave it

8:25

a secret thought of it. Right. It was like, yeah. We're in

8:27

a bar. Of course, people are smoking. What's a big deal? Remember

8:30

when they, you know, started talking about making a smoking

8:32

ban in

8:32

bars. Even though I wasn't a smoker, I was like, oh, that's

8:34

kind of weird, you know? Oh, wow. Yeah.

8:37

So I think it was it was probably something similar where

8:39

it was just very commonplace everywhere and no

8:41

one would be but most people probably didn't even give

8:43

it second thought.

8:44

If you went somewhere public like a restaurant

8:46

or there's just gonna be smoking and that's

8:48

just -- Right. -- way of

8:49

life. Okay? Right. You're just used to it.

8:51

So the fight

8:53

for smoke free skies was, you know,

8:55

was wrought with those unwilling to upend the status

8:58

quo and there were, of course, counter campaigns

9:00

funded by big tobacco and even the airlines

9:02

themselves. And consumer advocate

9:04

Ralph Nader started petitioning the

9:07

FAA to ban smoking on aircraft in nineteen

9:09

sixty nine. But The FAA

9:11

never responded to the petition, citing lack

9:13

of evidence that tobacco smoke was harmful in

9:16

the mistrations experienced on aircraft. So

9:18

their rationale was that You

9:20

know, even if tobacco smoke

9:22

was harmful, there's no evidence that it

9:24

was concentrated enough in a plane to be harmful

9:27

to anybody. On the moon. And, of course, the

9:29

airlines are gonna say that. Yeah. They don't wanna -- Yeah. --

9:31

say they have an unsafe environment.

9:33

Yeah.

9:34

They didn't say it regardless because then they don't wanna

9:36

be liable for Right. Any yeah.

9:38

And that name Ralph Nader.

9:40

I don't know if you're familiar with Ralph Nader.

9:43

Uh-huh. He he

9:45

wrote a book that came out in nineteen

9:47

sixty five called unsafe at any speed,

9:49

and it's because of that book which led

9:51

to the passage of the National Traffic and Motor

9:54

Vehicles Safety Act which

9:56

led to safety standards for motor vehicles

9:58

and road traffic. It's basically because of him that

10:00

cars got seatbelts. Okay. Yeah. I

10:03

know the name and I know him, like,

10:05

you know, in passing

10:07

through conversations and

10:08

things. But yeah. So he was a good consumer

10:11

safety advocate. You know, he'd already done a

10:13

lot of work to make cars and driving safer.

10:15

So I

10:15

think, you know, this was something that seemed

10:17

like a next step for him.

10:19

He's like, what else can I help? His

10:23

whole story was crazy. Like, I did a little bit of reading

10:25

up. Like, I probably like you. I kinda knew little bit

10:27

about Ralph Nader by some digging and some reading

10:29

when his name popped up for this. I was like,

10:31

oh, there was a lot more to his story. I didn't know. If

10:33

you're interested in that kind of stuff, highly recommend you

10:36

you look up some information on Ralph Nader.

10:38

Very interesting story. Anyway,

10:41

these two sides, right, Who

10:44

were dealing with the the the movement to

10:46

to ban smoking on planes? Both sides searched

10:48

for health research to confirm their stance.

10:50

Mhmm. The first break for nonspokers

10:53

came with the publication in nineteen

10:55

eighty six of the National Academy

10:57

of Sciences report on airliner cabin

10:59

environment, which recommended banning smoking

11:02

on all commercial flights. So, you

11:04

know, how I said the airlines were said that

11:06

it wasn't dangerous on the plane. There was no scientific

11:08

evidence. Right? Nobody had done the research. It wasn't

11:10

until nineteen eighty six that finally there was

11:13

clear research that

11:14

said, hey, This is not

11:16

safe. And

11:16

that's something they could point to. Be like, no.

11:19

Yeah. And then to your point, then

11:21

once comes out, I think airlines know

11:23

like, oh, now we can be hell liable because it

11:25

hasn't been proven. Yeah.

11:27

So nineteen eighty six, And then the

11:29

first the first banning was in

11:31

wait. Seventy one? Yeah. Seventy

11:33

one was the first nonspoking section. Section

11:36

nine. Section. Okay. Wow. And the first banning

11:38

was that Channel Islands

11:39

airline, Origny, from nineteen

11:42

seventy seven. And airlines

11:44

were reticent to pull back on

11:46

smoking because they didn't want to

11:49

lose customers?

11:51

Right. And, I mean, it's the whole if it ain't broke,

11:53

don't fix it, Mike. So, you know, why

11:56

spend any money to change anything when

11:58

Yeah. -- everything's fine the way it is. Yeah. That

12:00

makes sense. So you know,

12:02

the FAA was kinda unwilling to regulate in

12:04

flight smoking. So advocates turned to

12:06

the civil aeronautics board to

12:09

petition for relief the civil aeronautics

12:11

board does not exist anymore. It was an organization

12:13

that existed back then. It away

12:15

when airlines were deregulated. But at the time,

12:17

the the CAB was charged with the

12:19

economic regulation of airlines and was

12:22

located within the US Department of Commerce.

12:24

In nineteen seventy two, in response to another

12:27

nadir petition, citing polls indicating that

12:29

sixty percent of passengers were bothered by smoking

12:31

airplanes. The CAB issued a rule

12:33

requiring airlines to provide separate sections

12:35

for smokers and non smokers and

12:37

banned cigar and pipe smoking on aircraft.

12:41

So at first, FAA really wasn't

12:43

doing anything. So, you know, these people who were

12:45

trying to make movement know, started trying to get the

12:47

attention of the Civil Aeronautics board, and the

12:49

Civil Aeronautics board kinda started the process.

12:52

You know, let's let's least have smoking

12:54

in non smoking sections. And no more cigars

12:56

or pipes on a plane.

12:59

This might be obvious to sound, but,

13:01

like, is is a

13:03

a pipe or a cigar

13:06

worse like smokey wise?

13:08

Yeah. And it's lot stronger.

13:10

Okay. This

13:12

this analogous, like, the the syncedness of

13:14

the smoke Yeah.

13:17

IIII don't know I don't think I've ever

13:19

been around anyone who smokes a pipe, but I have been

13:21

around cigar smokers, and it is definitely lot

13:23

stronger. And this I mean, I've smoked cigar

13:26

too in

13:26

my Yeah. Yeah. I've smoked her,

13:27

but it's like and I'm sure I'm sure

13:29

there's incriminating photos that'll be smoking a cigar

13:31

somewhere.

13:32

I'm sure

13:32

it's happened probably five times in my

13:34

life. I've spoke I'll I'll

13:36

I've spoke cigars, you know, on occasion

13:38

for, like, you know, it's a

13:40

Yeah. I'm not trying to try a party

13:41

or a wedding or something and Yeah. I'm not trying to

13:43

take, like, some Sacramento's high road

13:45

here.

13:49

So congressional action in nineteen

13:51

eighty seven led to a ban on in flight

13:53

smoking.

13:55

And this is when the crazy set

13:57

of rules starts, Chris. So

13:59

in nineteen eighty eight -- Mhmm. --

14:01

airlines based in the United States

14:03

Cant smoking on domestic flights

14:05

of less than two hours. Band

14:07

smoke. Okay. So less than two hours. Less than two hours?

14:10

Can't smoke on it. Nineteen eighty eight.

14:12

Then in February

14:14

nineteen ninety, they extended that.

14:17

So you could not smoke on domestic flights

14:19

less than six hours. They're

14:22

doing the creep. They're doing the creep, Chris.

14:25

And think about it. What's really what's

14:27

a six hour domestic flight in the US?

14:29

It's a Hawaii. Maybe

14:32

yeah. To Hawaii. Maybe New York

14:34

to LA? Yeah. Even

14:36

that. I don't know. I don't think their flights are that

14:38

long. That's Yeah. It's Yeah. Now now they're pretty

14:40

they're pretty this is pretty much like banning

14:43

it without banning it. Yeah. Continental US

14:46

banning. Right. So that

14:48

what we said was February nineteen ninety, and

14:50

then the ban on smoking extended

14:52

to all domestic and international flights

14:55

in two

14:55

thousand. All domestic

14:58

and international. So two thousand

15:00

was whenever they were resend

15:02

everything. That is Right.

15:04

That seems way more recent

15:06

than I

15:07

would have thought. Like But that's super

15:09

recent. Cant, I probably

15:12

I don't I don't think I was

15:14

on any international flights before two

15:16

thousand. So My first international

15:18

flight was in two thousand four. Yeah.

15:20

And I could see that being where, you know,

15:23

people that there would be that last, like,

15:25

rim of of smoking, you know,

15:27

because there's such long flights. You can have

15:29

you know, fifteen hour flight and

15:32

they're a lot on bigger planes. So

15:34

-- Mhmm. -- so this

15:36

this ban that started well,

15:39

I guess, let me the ban from nineteen

15:41

ninety, the one for flights of six

15:43

hours -- Uh-huh. -- or less. That

15:45

ban applied to all

15:47

the passengers and the

15:48

cabin of the aircraft? All

15:51

the passengers in the cabin, but

15:54

but not the pilots, pilots. The pilots

15:56

were still allowed to smoke after the nineteen ninety

15:58

ban.

16:01

What are y'all doing up there? Did they come out

16:03

of the cockpit? It's just like, it's

16:06

all smoky.

16:08

Got they got like a little little

16:10

glass of whiskey and

16:11

a big cigar. Oh

16:13

my god.

16:14

Well, the the the reason

16:16

puts were allowed to continue smoking was

16:18

there were concerns about potential flight safety

16:20

issues because of nicotine withdrawal and

16:22

chronic smokers. Oh, yeah. I mean,

16:25

that especially for, like, long flights and stuff.

16:27

Right. So I'm gonna read a quote

16:29

here and then I'm gonna tell you who said it. And this

16:31

is the quote. If in fact

16:34

a cigarette is helpful to the pilot and co

16:36

pilot in a stressful situation, let

16:38

them have it. This is a quote by

16:40

Dave Brenton, who is president of smokers

16:43

rights of life. Yes. Then

16:45

then he goes on to say, I just wish people

16:47

were sympathetic with airline passengers who find

16:49

the flying experience a stressful

16:51

one. I Hey, I will

16:53

say this. If a plane is having big

16:55

issues and it might

16:57

go

16:57

down, and and the pilot,

16:59

it's gonna help him to light a cigarette. I

17:02

would be okay with it in that instance.

17:05

Chris, wouldn't it be funny

17:07

if there

17:07

was, like, you know, how there's, like,

17:09

glass boxes, like, in case of fire, break

17:11

glass, and stop it for five things in it. It's, like,

17:13

in case of crash mode glass, and there's, like, a

17:15

cigarette in there and a lighter.

17:20

And then then And then behind that

17:22

is another one with a fire extinguisher in

17:24

case the fire. Yeah.

17:28

Oh my goodness. Some of the rationale,

17:30

having to read some of this rationale, was

17:33

that the flight deck of the aircraft is better

17:35

ventilated that the passenger cabin and

17:37

has a separate air circulation system that

17:39

does not mix with that of the cabin. And that's

17:42

according to Dr. Andrew Horn

17:44

who was an official of the FAA's Office

17:46

of Aviation Medicine. So

17:48

they were kind of

17:51

making exceptions here.

17:53

In order to allow the pilots to continue

17:55

smoking circumventing the ban

17:57

for a while. Yeah. And and how how

18:00

the air circulation just in general, was it

18:02

like filtered and cleaned up or

18:04

or

18:05

So it's just related. Like, how I

18:08

I actually don't like that statement. This

18:10

was from an interview that I pulled

18:12

out from the New York Times at the back

18:15

at the time, there was a story about it. And

18:17

I feel like this statement

18:19

is a little too broad -- Mhmm. -- for

18:22

for my liking. Because as we've

18:24

talked about for every type of

18:26

aircraft or every different model of plane,

18:28

they're little different. Remember, talked about even

18:30

one incident where the pilots thought that the

18:32

bleed air came in from one engine, but it had switched

18:35

on that model and it came in from the other engine.

18:37

Like, things change I'm saying having a blanket

18:39

statement like this is a little misleading

18:42

to me. Yeah. But I think

18:44

that the spirit of

18:46

what the this what Dr. Andrew Horn was

18:48

trying to say is that in

18:50

general, there could be separate

18:53

AIR CIRCULATION SYSTEMS IN THE COCKET,

18:55

JUST LIKE FOR EXAMPLE IF

18:57

THERE'S A FIRE ON THE PLANE AND SMOTE GETS INTO

18:59

THE PASSENGER CABIN, there's probably a

19:02

separate feed for the air going into

19:04

the cockpit so the pilots can continue to operate

19:06

land the plane. Probably

19:09

something to that effect -- Right. -- because I imagine what

19:11

what they're trying to get at

19:12

here. That makes sense. But is

19:14

it filtered? Like, if someone smokes,

19:16

like back in the day when people were smoking on the

19:18

plane, would the air get sucked up

19:21

and then filtered back out? Because before

19:23

it gets As it stands even nowadays,

19:26

the air is circulated through constantly

19:28

in the cabin of a plane. The plane

19:31

in very simple terms leaks a lot of air.

19:35

So even though the bleed air

19:37

is constantly being air conditioned and pumped into

19:39

the plane, a ton of it still escaping

19:41

out of the plane at the same time. And we've talked about how

19:44

pressure relief valves and the air goes

19:45

out. So even if it's not being

19:48

filtered. It's probably being vented through very

19:50

cold. Okay. don't know that there were

19:52

specifically any smoking filters.

19:54

I doubt there were. But it was probably just the

19:56

fact that air gets circulated through so quickly.

19:59

Okay. So by a vote of hundred

20:01

ninety eight to a hundred ninety three, the House amended

20:03

the fiscal nineteen eighty eight Department of Transportation

20:05

Appropriations bill to ban smoking on

20:07

airline flights of two hours or less.

20:10

The bill was sent to the senate and passed by a

20:12

margin of eighty four to ten. So it was very

20:15

close vote in the House. Five votes

20:17

difference. Wow. But then you know, passed

20:19

overwhelmingly once it got to the senate. And

20:22

the ban on smoking aboard US domestic flights

20:24

of less than two hours went into effect April twenty

20:26

third nineteen eighty eight. It was meant

20:28

to last for two years expire in April nineteen

20:31

ninety and then face reconsideration. And

20:34

we talked about that. They updated February

20:36

nineteen ninety. And at the time, it levied

20:38

penalties of thousand dollars for passengers who

20:40

smoked on short flights. Two thousand

20:42

dollars renewal who tampered with disabled or destroyed

20:45

laboratory smoke detectors. And

20:47

after the nineteen eighty eight smoking ban went into

20:49

effect, Airlines like Northwest

20:51

used it as a marketing marketing opportunity implementing

20:54

a total non smoking policy on its domestic

20:56

flights. So I think that was kind

20:58

of smart of airlines like Northwest. Like, they see the

21:00

running on the wall. They know that this is coming.

21:03

Yeah. So why not get ahead of it? And then

21:05

try to use it to your advantage and and market.

21:07

You know? Yeah. I think that's, you

21:09

know, really forward looking on their part. One

21:11

of the sponsors of the bill, Richard

21:14

Durbin, who was a Democrat from Illinois

21:17

said that smoking poses a health hazard

21:19

to the nonsmoker who was sitting in the company of

21:21

someone smoking. And on the other

21:23

side, there was an opponent who's Harold Rogers, who's

21:25

a Republican from Kentucky, who said a

21:27

ban would jeopardize flight safety by forcing

21:29

some passengers to smoke surreptitiously an

21:31

airplane bath

21:32

rooms, which is kind of the fear.

21:34

Right? Yeah. Yeah. I

21:36

guess that's kind of

21:40

a backwards way of safe of

21:42

approaching safety? Do

21:44

you know? Or it's like, well, we

21:48

wanna be safe by allowing people

21:50

to do things that are gonna

21:53

like, so that they don't do something

21:55

illegal that could jeopardize

21:58

people. I

21:58

don't know. Yeah.

21:59

But I get it. Yeah. And in Cant,

22:02

so, you know, reading this Maybe

22:04

start digging through the incidents, Chris. Mhmm.

22:06

In nineteen seventy three, there

22:08

was a case involving a lit cigarette thrown into

22:11

a lavatory waste bin which led

22:13

to a cabin fire, which led

22:15

to Varek Flight 820

22:17

crashing. Oh. The flight

22:19

was headed to Paris from Rio de Janeiro

22:22

and had to make an emergency landing in a

22:24

field near O'Reilly Airport. And

22:26

in that crash, a hundred twenty three people lost

22:28

their lives and only eleven survived.

22:30

Wow. Of which ten were crew

22:32

members and one was a passenger. I thought that was

22:34

the really

22:35

-- Interesting. -- that is. -- note there. Yeah. That's

22:37

unusual. Yeah. It's really unusual. And

22:39

the reason is before the oh,

22:41

the fire was yeah.

22:42

Many passengers had died of carbon monoxide poisoning

22:45

in the cabin. As you said it and we were

22:47

moving

22:47

on. I was like, it's probably because the fire is in the back

22:49

of the plane, and there's -- Right. -- in the front.

22:51

Right. And then this crash

22:53

was, you know, like I said, it's

22:56

one of it's this is one of those crashes where they

22:58

cannot one hundred percent say it was

23:01

the cause of the crash, but all evidence points

23:03

to that there was a cigarette disposed

23:05

of in a laboratory waste bin,

23:07

which led to this cabin fire. And this

23:09

incident, Varek Flight 820,

23:12

is the reason now that there are placards

23:14

even still to this day in the bathroom telling

23:16

you not to throw cigarettes into the trash bin.

23:18

I'm sure you see them anytime you're in the bathroom

23:20

on a plane. And it's also the

23:22

reason that you still they still do the announcement

23:25

saying smoking is prohibited in the lavatories.

23:27

Yeah. Even though But to this day now, fifty

23:30

years later. They're still telling

23:32

us that because of this crash. This

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Wherever you get podcasts, that's

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tales from the Stinky Dragon. There

27:28

was actually a couple other cases. These didn't

27:30

have very much detail on

27:32

them, so I'm just gonna kinda read through them as, you

27:34

know, supplementary notes here.

27:37

There was another case of fire started by smoking

27:39

passenger in nineteen eighty two, which

27:41

resulted in China Northwest Airlines flight

27:43

twenty three eleven evacuating passengers on

27:45

the runway of Guangzhou, Bayou

27:47

and International Airport. The Cant developing

27:49

fire killed twenty five passengers and seriously

27:52

injured twenty two passengers and

27:54

four crew members before destroying the

27:55

aircraft. There wasn't very much information

27:58

on that incident at all. Still.

28:01

Mhmm. And then if you wanna go even earlier.

28:03

So if you like, we were talking about the

28:05

early days of aviation. Uh-huh. I've got I've got

28:07

one for you, Chris. There was an incident

28:09

in nineteen thirty seven on

28:11

an aeroplot flight from Moscow

28:13

to Prague that crashed near Harina

28:16

Romania after a passenger lit cigarette

28:19

been disposed of it in the toilet, causing

28:21

accumulated gas fumes to ignite

28:24

gas fumes. Right? There were gas fumes

28:26

that had collected in the

28:27

toilet, like from from the

28:29

the plane gas. And

28:30

Okay. -- I was like, there's a different types of

28:31

gas. No. No. No. No. No. Eighty gas.

28:34

mean, all six occupants was three passengers

28:36

and three crew members were killed. How did they accumulate

28:39

in the toilet? I think

28:41

I don't know. Again, this is another one of those incidents

28:43

where there wasn't a ton of information. I

28:46

bet there was a design flaw where, you

28:48

know, he was like, he fumes from

28:51

the gas tank escaped and

28:53

then, like, collected somewhere and it just so

28:55

happy to collect it in the toilet. And

28:57

and so, wait, did it, like, explode?

29:01

I think so. So the

29:03

toilet in the bathroom exploded

29:07

on the lake. That is it. Yes.

29:09

Because someone

29:11

threw a cigarette into the toilet, not

29:13

because someone -- Yeah. Yeah. -- ate something really

29:15

bad.

29:16

But still, Yeah. And

29:18

I'm sure you've seen them. The bathrooms

29:21

on your planes are still equipped with ashtrays as

29:24

there are still passengers willing to violate the smoking

29:26

Cant. And they would need a safe place

29:28

dispose of their cigarette butts, you

29:31

know, in the case that they break the rules. So

29:33

that's why it remains to this day

29:36

an FAA requirement to have an ash

29:38

tray as minimum equipment in

29:40

or around the lavatory. So minimum

29:42

equipment means the plane cannot take off

29:44

unless it's there. So Wow.

29:47

So should a plane have an ashtray that does not function

29:49

properly? It must be replaced within three

29:51

days. And in two thousand

29:53

nine, There was a British Airways flight from

29:55

London to Mexico City that was reportedly

29:58

delayed because the Boeing seven forty

30:00

seven was in need of an appropriate replacement

30:02

for an ash tree that was out of

30:03

service. That is crazy.

30:06

We we can't take we can't take off

30:08

because how

30:09

did it just did someone just put gum in it or

30:11

something? Like, what? might have been it might have

30:13

been, you know, like, stuck where it wouldn't open

30:15

or who knows? Maybe, like, it got banged

30:17

up. III don't know.

30:20

Yeah. I'm I'm glad you brought that

30:22

up. There was a we're I was going through messages

30:25

for the q

30:27

and a and and stuff to talk about

30:29

for the first first class episode we're

30:32

in about to record, and Kate moves

30:34

to Brighton and had messaged asking specifically

30:37

why they're still ashtrays

30:40

in in the toilets on planes? Well,

30:42

there you go. You don't want the toilet exploding?

30:46

Obviously, I mean, come on. In

30:50

nineteen seventy six, the US civil aeronautics

30:52

board banned cigar and pipe smoking on aircraft.

30:55

But under pressure from tobacco

30:57

interests, it sought to limit this ban in nineteen

30:59

seventy eight. Also, the CAB

31:01

banned, then unbanned smoking in nineteen eighty

31:04

four. With chairman Dan McKinnon saying

31:06

philosophically, I think non smokers have rights,

31:08

but it comes into marked conflict with practicalities

31:11

and the realities of life. So you see, even

31:13

though, you know, that's why I kinda said at the

31:15

beginning, even though this seems like a very straightforward

31:17

thing, it went through a long

31:20

process to get to the point where we are

31:22

nowadays. Yeah. Especially

31:24

factoring in, like, cigarette

31:27

lobbyists.

31:28

Right. Who who are actively fighting everything?

31:31

Right. There's there's there's there's money

31:34

fighting it. In two thousand four, a

31:36

Supreme Court case, Olympic airways versus

31:38

Hussein awarded seven hundred thousand

31:41

dollars in damages after passenger doctor

31:43

Abid Hanson had a fatal anaphylactic

31:45

reaction from sensitivity to secondhand smoke

31:48

Oh, even though he was seated in a non smoking

31:50

section on Olympic Airways flight

31:52

four seventeen in nineteen ninety eight.

31:55

So that that's kinda that's another Yeah.

31:57

Twist to it. Right? There's,

31:59

you know, people who, you know, you

32:01

could you know, that most people is like, oh, it's

32:03

it's annoying. It's inconveniencing me.

32:05

I don't like to smell. Or like long

32:08

term secondhand smoke is bad, but

32:10

if you're getting

32:10

it. Yeah. But this is like a direct

32:13

secondhand smoke causes person to

32:15

to die.

32:16

Yeah. That's that's what?

32:18

That's hard that's pretty hard

32:20

to argue. Yes. In

32:22

nineteen eighty three and nineteen eighty four, congressional

32:24

hearings were held on the subject of smoking

32:27

on airliners, highlighting the fact that data

32:29

on airplane Cant and air quality were contradictory,

32:31

and no standards existed for acceptable levels

32:34

taminates such as tobacco smoke. Mind you, this

32:36

is before that study we talked about which came out in

32:38

nineteen eighty six. This is when they're all kind

32:40

of arguing because there is no scientific data

32:42

yet. So Congress therefore directed

32:44

the National Research Council of the National

32:46

Academy of Sciences to conduct a study of air

32:49

quality standards on commercial aircraft and

32:51

determine whether deficient air

32:53

quality could be responsive for health problems.

32:55

And that's the report we talked about. That's the nineteen

32:57

eighty six national research council's

33:00

report. Which was the

33:02

airliner cabin environment, air quality,

33:04

and safety. And it proposed that

33:06

smoking be banned on all commercial flights within

33:08

the United States. Other

33:10

key findings of the report included that full

33:13

time flight attendants received second Cant smoke exposure

33:15

approximately equal to living with a pack a day

33:17

smoker and that potential health

33:19

effects of secondhand smoke outweighed concerns

33:21

about smokers nicotine withdrawal on flights.

33:25

In February of nineteen eighty seven, the FAA

33:27

reported to Congress regarding NRC report

33:29

on the airliner cabin environment, agreeing

33:32

with many of the NRC's findings though asserting

33:34

that more study was required before smoking

33:36

ban could be recommended. So that's This

33:38

is when the window starts closing. Now there's

33:41

scientific data.

33:42

There's, like, empirical evidence that

33:44

this is not good. And

33:47

I'm sure there's, at the same time,

33:49

in respect to to

33:51

planes, the same thing is happening

33:53

everywhere. I mean, right,

33:56

restaurants and and and other

33:58

-- Yeah. -- in

33:59

general, like, places where

34:01

smoke areas where you can smoke publicly

34:04

are probably shrinking?

34:06

Right. I know I definitely remember being a

34:08

kid and going to restaurants like you said and they were

34:10

smoking in non smoking sections, but I bet

34:12

I don't know where you could find that anyway anymore.

34:15

Nowadays, but I think that this is

34:17

around that time where the where things

34:19

start changing and, you know, smoking is not allowed.

34:22

In these confined spaces in general anymore.

34:24

I went to to Singapore couple

34:26

of years ago, Chris -- Uh-huh. -- and

34:29

you could not even smoke outside

34:31

unless you were in designated smoking area

34:33

outside. Wow. Like, there's, like,

34:36

mark at least core I wasn't Singapore. There

34:38

were markings on the ground. Like, you could smoke

34:40

inside this box and even though you're

34:42

outside. Throughout the entire

34:45

city area

34:46

-- Yeah. -- like or was it everywhere

34:48

I saw. It was like that.

34:50

Again, I I was only there for, like, a

34:52

week, so I don't know the law behind

34:54

that. But definitely something I saw I noticed. I

34:56

think I took a few photos with my

34:57

photos and I oh, that's weird. Oh, maybe

34:59

that's what I'll post on on

35:03

our social

35:03

media. Let's

35:05

see if I could find those. So in

35:08

November of nineteen eighty seven, a study by the

35:10

National Cancer Institute and the Canadian

35:12

Ministry of Health and Welfare and Air Canada

35:15

published in in

35:17

JAMA in February of nineteen eighty nine.

35:19

Found that passengers in non smoking sections

35:22

were exposed to cigarette smoke in

35:24

some cases at levels comparable to those experienced

35:26

by passengers seated in smoking sections.

35:29

In the NCI's press release about the study,

35:31

searching General Coup urged that

35:33

cigarette smoking be banned on all commercial

35:35

flights. Legislation of bans smoking

35:37

in all domestic flights permanently was introduced

35:39

in the US Senate in March nineteen eighty nine,

35:42

the house transportation committee's aviation committee

35:44

held hearings in June regarding legislation limiting

35:46

or banning smoking on airlines, testimony

35:49

cited a survey conducted by the American Association

35:51

of Respiratory Care, which indicated that

35:54

more than eighty percent of thirty thousand passengers

35:56

surveyed wanted to see permanent extension

35:58

of the Cant, and the FAA had received fewer

36:00

than a hundred and twenty complaints. Relating

36:03

to the band's enforcement during the period when

36:05

four hundred forty five million people traveled.

36:07

That's kind of really

36:10

really highlighting it. Mhmm. If you think about

36:12

it, Four hundred forty five million people traveled and

36:14

there were less than a hundred and twenty complaints.

36:17

Meanwhile, eighty percent of people surveyed wanted

36:19

to see an extension of the ban. At that point.

36:21

It's like -- Yeah. -- it's it's pretty clear --

36:23

Yeah. -- which way the

36:25

the winds blow. And and it's funny. What

36:27

what year is this? Nineteen eighty nine? Eighty

36:30

percent wanted to see an extension of the ban.

36:32

That means twenty percent, I guess,

36:34

either had no opinion or wanted to see it go away.

36:36

I wonder if that's around the percentage of people who

36:38

were smoking at that time.

36:40

Yeah. Yeah. This is a

36:42

random question. Did airlines sell

36:45

cigarettes

36:46

or hand them out for free? Was it like an

36:48

amenity? That's a good question,

36:50

Chris. I don't know. If I had

36:52

to guess, I would guess that they

36:55

probably had free cigars for people

36:57

in first class. That seems like I don't know

36:59

that, but that seems right to me. Yeah.

37:01

So after all of that, in nineteen ninety, Congress

37:04

made permanent the ban on smoking on domestic flights

37:06

of two hours or less and expanded it to include

37:08

all domestic flights of six hours or less, which

37:10

we talked about. I don't know where

37:12

you would fly. Currently, I just did a

37:14

quick Google search flying nonstop

37:17

from New York to LA is six hours and twenty

37:19

five minutes. Six hour oh,

37:21

so you would barely get around that bed.

37:24

You could smoke on that flight.

37:27

You're like, man, I really need a smoke. I'm gonna go to LA.

37:30

What are people would take slightly

37:32

more inconvenient

37:33

flights. So they get to be able to smoke.

37:35

In an effort to influence the International

37:38

Civil Aviation Organization, the

37:40

coalition on smoking or health, which was

37:42

a It's a now defunct Coalition of American

37:45

Heart Association, the American Lung

37:47

Association, the American Cancer Society.

37:50

They, in concert with the European

37:52

Bureau for on smoking pollution, the

37:54

Canadian Cancer Society and the International

37:56

Organization of Consumers Unions kicked

37:59

off the campaign for smoke free skies

38:01

worldwide. Because remember, so far, we've only

38:03

talked about the United States. Mhmm. So now,

38:05

you know, these these organizations globally

38:08

who coming together trying to get this

38:11

kind of legislation all around the world.

38:13

And they try to encourage groups from different

38:15

countries to work together, to launch

38:17

a long term effort, to achieve smoke

38:19

free airline flights everywhere. And

38:23

we've talked about the ICO,

38:25

the International Civil Aviation Organization, They're

38:28

based in Montreal. It's a united nations

38:30

affiliated body that sets international

38:32

standards for air transportation and

38:35

the standards must be agreed to by member nations.

38:38

Who were called contracting states. So

38:40

it's like the world's FAA

38:42

that might not be the perfect analogy,

38:44

but it's like they just set the rules globally

38:47

for aviation. All kinds

38:49

of aviation.

38:50

Yeah. It's I mean, I guess that's a good that's how

38:52

you get big change passes,

38:54

like Right.

38:55

Yeah. That's

38:56

also how you end up with things

38:58

that are standardized. Yeah. Conformit.

39:00

Yeah. Because then you you know and

39:03

it's not like, well, Even

39:05

people who work there with airlines are not having

39:07

to constantly educate people because of different rules

39:09

and different regulations on

39:11

it. Or just think think about, like, flying a

39:13

plane like, let's say you're flying a

39:15

a passenger plane in Europe -- Right.

39:17

-- going from what before the European Union,

39:20

before the EU. It's like, oh, we just cross invisible

39:22

line in the sky. Yeah. All the rules are different

39:24

now. Yeah. Yeah.

39:27

So it's good that there is this uniformity.

39:30

But anyway, as result of all this pressure,

39:33

the International Civil Aviation Organization approved

39:35

resolution in nineteen ninety two to

39:37

eliminate smoking on international commercial

39:39

flights by July first nineteen

39:41

ninety six. And though not legally

39:43

binding, the resolution did present accepted

39:45

standard for airlines. And the campaign also

39:48

encouraged Canada and Australia to ban smoking

39:50

on all commercial flights. And as a further

39:52

step, the United States Australia, New

39:54

Zealand, Cant, mutually agreed to ban smoking

39:57

on all flights between the countries in nineteen

39:59

ninety four. And let me tell

40:01

you, if you're that's one of the longest flights

40:03

I've ever been on in my life. Is the United States to Australia

40:05

and New Zealand? Yeah. If

40:07

you can make it not smoking on that flight, you can

40:10

make it anywhere. Yeah. Yeah. That is a

40:12

long flight. That is a very long flight.

40:14

In December nineteen ninety four, eight

40:16

airlines, American Airlines, British

40:18

Airways, Continental, KLM, Northwest,

40:20

TWA, United, and US Air

40:23

jointly petitioned the Department of Transportation

40:26

for antitrust immunity so that

40:28

they could work together to Cant smoking bans

40:30

on international flights.

40:33

Delta American United, Cathay Pacific,

40:35

Singapore Airlines, and Virgin Atlantic, had

40:38

by this time already implemented their own bands.

40:40

So they're they're kinda like, hey, you

40:42

know, normally we can't work together because

40:44

of because of antitrust

40:47

laws. Can we work together on this one so

40:49

long before they get? And

40:53

then this this this, like, domino effect

40:55

of airlines just continued throughout

40:57

the nineties, Sabina, Swiss Air,

40:59

Austrian Airlines, Ben, smoking on transatlantic

41:02

flights in nineteen ninety seven and

41:04

United American bands smoking on all of

41:06

their flights. In nineteen ninety eight,

41:08

Brazil bands smoking on all domestic and international

41:11

flights and among private carriers, Royal

41:13

Air, Morocco, British Airways,

41:15

Virgin Atlantic, Lufthansa, Air Lingust,

41:17

Finnair, Iceland Air, Scandinavian Air,

41:20

smoking all their flights. What

41:22

was the last airline?

41:24

Or what where can you

41:26

still smoke? That's a good question.

41:29

Let me have a few more dates in airline. Sorry.

41:31

Let me read this. No. No. And then let me read this and

41:33

then we'll we'll talk about that. In nineteen ninety

41:35

nine, Saudi airlines, Japan airlines, Aeromexico,

41:38

Span Air, Zimbabwe, Qatar

41:40

Airways all followed suit. And

41:42

in two thousand, when the USA banned smoking

41:44

all domestic international flights enacted as part

41:46

of an aviation overhaul bill, and by

41:48

that time, ninety seven point seven

41:50

percent of all US international flights were already

41:52

smoke free due to both governmental regulation

41:55

and voluntary action by airlines. And

41:57

that same year, Air France and Sudan Airways

42:00

began smoking on their flights. And

42:02

a few stragglers joined the Spok Free Club

42:04

in two thousand one and two thousand two with

42:06

Emirates airline, Middle East airlines, Bimman,

42:09

Bangladesh Airlines, and Saudi Arabian

42:11

Airlines implementing their own smoking bans.

42:14

That's the last dates I have here

42:16

in my document. Mhmm. I don't know

42:18

if you can I I bet

42:20

Chris, there's gotta be a country somewhere out there

42:22

where you can still smoke on a plane? That too.

42:24

Like,

42:25

private private airlines, I

42:27

think you can. Oh,

42:29

maybe.

42:31

I'll I'll be honest, Chris. You know, I can fly

42:33

that little sesame. If you wanna smoke a cigarette

42:35

in there, I don't know you can.

42:37

I don't want to. It's funny you say that

42:39

in in the plane I did most

42:41

of my private pilot training in, there's a

42:43

a little ashtray in it. And I never obviously,

42:45

I don't smoke. I never use the ashtray, but it's

42:47

convenient because I can clip my head it onto

42:49

it. So I like I like having that ashtray there

42:51

just because I Cant my headset controls

42:54

right there.

42:56

This is I'm not sure how

42:58

research this is, but

43:01

are there any airline flights where smoking

43:03

is allowed short answer to this is

43:05

no. Smoking is banned on all commercial

43:08

airline flights. There is a sub note,

43:10

although it is

43:10

rare, a few international airline

43:13

companies such as Kibana, Iran

43:15

air, Air, Algeria still are smoking

43:17

in restricted sections in some of their flights.

43:19

So I guess. Yet, that's what

43:21

was gonna say. I I found that

43:23

Kibana banned smoking on international flights

43:26

in twenty fourteen. That

43:29

they may have been the last holdout. And

43:31

that's according to the point

43:33

sky. Okay. That's

43:35

wild. That is making this. And and

43:37

e cigs aren't allowed. Right? No.

43:40

No. Okay. Definitely

43:40

not. Well,

43:41

now now, Chris, I wanna go fly a plane

43:43

that spoke. Just

43:48

that sounds like me when I was when

43:50

I turned eighteen, I wanted to exercise

43:52

all my new rights, so III

43:54

went

43:57

and I bought some

43:59

cigarettes and some

44:03

a playboy and a

44:05

lottery ticket. And maybe

44:08

I I also voted it. What

44:10

a weekend? It wasn't all at once. And

44:13

I don't even smoke cigarettes. So

44:15

I do think I just bought them just because

44:17

Mhmm. I bought I bought a pack of cigarettes

44:20

once when I was

44:22

Hold on. I was nineteen or twenty. I

44:24

bought it from that seven eleven over

44:27

at, like, tenth of Lamar.

44:29

I bought a pack of cigarettes there. And I tried smoking

44:31

a cigarette. And I was like, yeah, that it's

44:33

not for me. Yeah. I I was like

44:35

walking by, like, bunch of smokers who were

44:37

like standing outside of that ACC

44:39

campus at Rio

44:40

Grande. They were all like,

44:41

Cant I was like, hey, does anybody want this? I was giving

44:43

it, like, the pack of cigarettes. You

44:46

know, Gus, I might be wrong. I wanna

44:48

say my first time smoking a cigarette

44:50

was this was

44:52

forever ago. Was in

44:54

the sound booth at rooster

44:57

teeth at our old office. When

44:59

I did I did this silly sketch.

45:02

It was like AAI

45:04

was playing Bob Dillon,

45:06

recording

45:08

music or something I was doing.

45:10

Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I was, like, smoking a

45:12

cigarette and doing a bad Bob

45:14

Dylan impression in the sound booth.

45:16

I remember that. Yeah. Is it and

45:19

just like it was smoking a cigarette. The

45:21

whole time, it was just like filling the sound booth

45:24

with smoke. That might have been my

45:26

first cigarette.

45:29

That's really funny. Okay.

45:33

In October of twenty fifteen, the United States

45:35

Department of Transportation ended all types of in

45:37

flight smoking. When it prohibited the use

45:40

of electronic cigarettes, you were just asking about that.

45:42

As well as transporting such devices in checked

45:44

luggage because of the fire risk from their batteries.

45:47

In July twenty nineteen, an Air China

45:49

aircraft made an emergency to set after

45:51

cabin oxygen levels dropped, which had been

45:53

linked to a co pilot, smoking an e

45:56

cigarette during the flight. That's

45:59

a little scary. Today, air travelers

46:01

around the globe are able to enjoy smoke free

46:04

environments in flight and violators of the smoking

46:06

ban can face a fine for smoking or vaping

46:08

on a flight that can range from two dollars

46:11

to four thousand dollars. By itself,

46:13

it's not a jealable offense, but it can quickly escalate

46:15

if a person is found to hampered with the smoke detector

46:18

or fail to comply with a crew member's instructions

46:20

such as to stop smoking. Generally,

46:23

while a person may be arrested and removed from a flight

46:25

for smoking or vaping, Unless there

46:27

was more to the incident, there'll only be a fine imposed.

46:29

However, be warned on some international flights

46:31

depending on the destination country a person

46:34

could be arrested upon arrival and put into

46:36

jail. So there

46:38

are there are differences depending on where you're

46:40

going. But that's it. A very

46:43

long convoluted, like

46:45

meandering story about

46:47

smoking on airplanes. I just

46:50

just you think about them being put in jail and

46:52

it's it's a separate little jail,

46:54

like a little

46:56

like what you said in Singapore where they just have square,

46:59

weren't they? They're they're putting smokers

47:01

too.

47:03

That's funny. Yeah. That's it. This I

47:05

I don't know. I think this this subject's really

47:08

interesting because

47:09

it happened a lot more recently, I think, than

47:11

than most people realize how much

47:13

people think about. Yeah. That's it

47:15

is when you sometimes when you take apart

47:18

and and look really look at

47:20

the dates of

47:20

things, it's it's wild. Mhmm.

47:23

But that's it. We'll be back in

47:26

in couple more weeks with another supplemental

47:29

episode, and then After that, we'll

47:31

be back with more regular black box down

47:33

episodes. And

47:34

oh, but we are gonna be making a a first

47:36

class episode. Was that what you're gonna say? I'm sorry. Yeah.

47:38

So we'll have that and we'll talking about some

47:40

news articles and answering some q and a

47:42

that've been sent in and just a

47:44

a few other things that people have asked us to

47:46

chat about. Yeah. Alright.

47:49

And you can learn more about that at black box

47:51

down pod dot com, and you can support

47:53

us either directly in Apple

47:55

Podcasts, Spotify, or the website, or

47:58

subscribing to Resideo first. Ed, if

48:00

you're just looking for something else to listen to,

48:02

that's besides Black Box sound, we are

48:04

just finished up the finale of

48:06

our big campaign or

48:08

a big story for tales from Stinky

48:10

Dragon. It's kind of our comedy tabletop

48:14

gaming podcast. It's don't need

48:16

to know anything about DND or gaming.

48:18

It's just fun, comedy, very

48:20

immersive and and and silly. Just

48:24

look for a tales through a sticky dragon. Anywhere you

48:26

listen Cant, highly recommend it Gus'

48:28

DM. I'm in it as

48:30

character called gum gum. And

48:33

we'll talk more about that later

48:35

because we have a bonus episode. We're gonna have

48:38

another cast member on it soon, but It's

48:40

a good thing to check out if you wanna --

48:41

Yeah. -- find something else to listen to.

48:43

Thumbs up. Alright. Thanks for listening. Hey,

48:57

everyone. It's Barbara Dunkelman. Host of

48:59

Always Open. A podcast where we get

49:01

into it all from mental health, sex,

49:03

relationships to astrology, fan

49:05

fiction, pop culture, and so much

49:07

more. Nothing is off the table.

49:09

New episodes are available now, wherever

49:12

you listen to Cant, And if you Cant

49:14

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