The door in business is there, but passengers will no longer be able to close it: here's why

The latest fashion in terms of business class seats is the door, that is, to offer the possibility for passengers to isolate themselves completely from the rest of the plane. The first was Qatar's QSuite, Since then voted the best business class cabin in the world. After that came all the others, from British Airways to Delta, from Iberia to Air France and KLM.

Then there is one airline that was the first to install doors in business class, not on wide-body aircraft but on single-aisle aircraft: the carrier in question is JetBlue, which aboard its A321neo - with which it flies from Europe to the U.S. and beyond - offers the spectacular business class cabin renamed the "Mint Suite"

In-flight service, all companies should copy Jetblue

Here, let's imagine that you have booked a flight right in the Mint Suite: once you board, however, you discover that your cabin door cannot close. Undoubtedly a nasty surprise. No, it is not broken: simply the opening and closing mechanism has been disabled by the cabin crew. This is exactly what is happening on board the A321neo by JetBlue.

"And why is that?" you may be wondering. Well, the reason why is because of a decision by the FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration, which requires airlines to have on board an extra flight attendant (in addition to the minimum number required by law that varies by aircraft) to handle this procedure.The U.S. agency made this decision because it believes that the workload to lock and unlock the doors is excessive for 'only' 4 flight attendants; in fact, in all aircraft (except Air France's A350), cabin crew must manually lock and unlock the door mechanism, one by one.

The regulations require that there be one flight attendant for every 50 passengers; the math is soon done. The A321neo aircraft used by JetBlue have a capacity of 160 seats and are set up in two cabins: 16 business seats (the famous 'Mint class'), and 144 in economy; by law, therefore, there must be four flight attendants on board the plane.

Since March, however, the FAA has decided what we wrote earlier, and JetBlue has been forced to staff an extra cabin attendant. And this will be the case until mid-August, when there will be 4 flight attendants again; from then on, the opening and closing of the door will be disabled. It is good to specify one thing: this issue affects only the A321neo; in the other A321s, both 'ceo' and 'long range' versions, door operation will not be disabled.

JetBlue's A321 flies from NY to London and Paris, its business class is a one-of-a-kind suite (video)

This news can only displease: sure, JetBlue's Mint remains a great product: space is not lacking and neither is comfort; But with the door closed it was a whole other thing. 

This article has been updated from its initial version following a clarification received from JetBlue.

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