This article was written by The Zillennial Zine’s spring editorial intern Amna Faheem. Find her on Instagram at @amnaf.aheem. If you would like to share an article with The Zillennial, send us an email at thezillennialzine@gmail.com.
Air travel is notoriously hectic for all involved. Check-in and ticketing, TSA and its fast-paced high-tension line, the hunting down of your gate with your carry-on bags in tow, the boarding process, and getting your small suitcase to fit in the overhead compartment- all you want after such a stressful pre-flight journey is to sit in your seat and have a relaxing trek to your destination. But you can’t. You were so worried about getting on to the plane that you didn’t even think about the plane itself. You packed everything you needed for your stay once you deboarded the airplane, but you neglected to think about what you would need when you were on the plane itself.
Airplanes are not known for their cleanliness. While a cleaning service is provided between each landing and take-off, it’s nearly impossible to deeply sterilize the seats and the areas around them fully for the incoming passengers. The seats, the armrests, the headrests- all features of the individual chairs keep residue of the previous occupant’s presence. Nobody wants to think about all the germs that are floating around them as they embark on flight hours in the air. Most of us don’t take it into account when we get ready for our adventures- the most preparation we do for the plane is bringing a neck pillow and an eye mask. But we don’t consider some of the most important items that we should be bringing with us.
It’s necessary to think about the hygiene that goes into traveling and how to make your space- and yourself- as clean as possible during your voyage. Airplanes typically hold around 300 people for an international flight. That’s 300 other people in addition to yourself breathing the same air as you, using the same bathrooms as you, all in one confined space for hours on end. While airplane ventilation systems are present and put in a lot of work, you’re still stuck in one restricted space. With the right travel hygiene tips, you can make your flight as clean as possible.
Tricks to Keep Yourself Clean
There are a lot of hands that go into your travel experience. Hands giving you your boarding pass and touching your documents, hands looking at your identification papers and making contact with your bags, hands checking your person in TSA, hands that touch the crates before you that you put your backpack in as you go through security. Hands that have touched your seat, your headrest, your tray, and the pocket in front of you.
Too many hands go into travel. Hands that you don’t know anything about. But you can control your own.
It’s unrealistic to expect yourself to not touch anything or to be able to wash your hands at every step of your travel journey in the airport. An easy and simple solution is to pack with you a small travel-sized bottle of hand sanitizer. While the cleaning crew does come in and give love to the aircraft, they mostly focus on the common areas- bathroom and food areas- emptying the trash and vacuuming the floors. Seat pockets are emptied of waste, and yes, seats are wiped down. But there is simply not enough time or manpower to get into every crevice and ensure that the cleaning job is thorough. Through no fault of the cleaning crew, your seat is not 100 percent clean. Target and other stores sell travel-friendly packs of wipes you can put in your fanny pack. Wiping down your seat and the area around it can give you that piece of mind and make certain the space is cleaned to your liking. Putting your neck pillow in a protective case or bag before you use it will limit its contact with surfaces that have mysterious germs. As well, putting your eye mask, if you have one, in a pocket inside your bag is a safe choice. You don’t want to put something on your face that has come in contact with the whole airport.
Public bathrooms, in general, are not to be trifled with. Bathrooms on airplanes are on a different level. A study revealed that the flush button in airplane bathrooms has about 265 bacteria colony-forming units per square inch. When using the bathroom, make sure to handle everything with a tissue and not directly with your hands. This will limit the amount of germs and bacteria you come into contact with. When you flush, close the lid of the toilet before doing so to keep the waste and its germs from flying into the air and into your lungs as you breathe (this is a good tip to utilize in your everyday life, too). If you want to be extra careful, use the paper tissue toilet seat cover before you sit down.
Surprisingly, the bathroom is not the dirtiest place on the airplane. It’s the trays in the back of the seats.
The trays get touched by everyone multiple times, and they rarely get the same wipe-down service as the seats themselves do. The same study found that setback trays carry 2,155 colony-forming units per square inch- that is eight times more than the toilet flush button in the bathroom. Because the trays are used to put your food on and eat off of, it’s arguably the most important feature of your area to clean. Certain bacteria are able to live on surfaces for long periods of time, so you want to make sure you’re exercising caution and taking the steps necessary to clean your area as best you can. Using the wipes you have, make sure to give them some love and wipe them down well before you use them in any capacity. Your seat buckle is also something that is unavoidable and has been touched by an alarming amount of people. Sanitizing your hand or even the buckle is advisable to avoid getting sick or making contact with any germs.
Traveling can be overwhelming, and packing for your destination might seem like the most important thing. While that certainly is a top priority, you want to make sure you’re setting yourself up for success on your trip and keeping up with travel hygiene tips to keep yourself healthy.
Do you follow any of these travel hygiene tips? Let us know in the comments below!
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