We’re flying again, but passengers don’t want to eat on short haul flights | VIDEO

Nothing screams ‘normal’ more that the resumption of catering services on domestic light services. After 2 months of sitting at the back of the planes checking their phones, flight crews are again peddling their selection of drinks and snacks. But there now appears a general reluctance for people getting back into the habit of eating on the scheduled services. Speaking to the head flight attendant on a service from Phuket to Bangkok this morning, he confirmed that people are currently reticent to get back into the habit of eating on short flights.

The Thai Civil Aviation Authority of Thailand has lifted the ban on food and drinks services on domestic flights, again. Once the safety demo is over, that’s the last you see of the flight attendants as they head to the back of the plane – there’s been nothing else for them to do because of the ban on food and in-flight services.

Following the December outbreaks of new clusters of Covid-19 the CAAT imposed the catering ban on flights again but didn’t ground the airlines for a second time. But the airlines reduced the number of flights and cancelled some routes to ride out the new surge in cases.

Commercial flights were suspended first back in April 2020 due to the initial outbreak of Covid-19 in Thailand. The Aviation Authority then allowed domestic flights to resume on May 1, although airlines were barred from serving food and drinks on board for flights that did not exceed 2 hours, just about every flight in Thailand.

But just because people CAN now buy a cup of noodles or orange juice again doesn’t mean they will. For the past year flights have been without any catering, more than they’ve had the services, and it seems flyers are now used to getting through their short flight without any snacks.