Where Flight Attendants Rest

Airlines are constantly raising the bar when it comes to luxury and comfort for passengers, as airliners are flying farther than ever before.

An Airbus A350-1000 XWB aircraft. Andreas Zeitler/Shutterstock.com


But while passengers reap the benefit of glitzy lie-flat business-class seats and even couches in economy on some airlines, not all those onboard — namely flight attendants — get to enjoy the same opulence.

Touring Scandinavian Airlines' Airbus A350-900 XWB. Thomas Pallini/Insider


Hidden in the back of wide-body aircraft are the small compartments in which flight attendants spend their downtime. They're aptly named crew rest areas and are where flight attendants will go when they have a break from service or their other responsibilities.

The crew rest area on an Airbus A350-900 XWB aircraft. Thomas Pallini/Insider

The areas are off-limits to passengers, and even their entryways are discreetly embedded into an aircraft's architecture to help protect against unwanted visitors.  READ MORE...

Private Jet Attendants

Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/Getty

After decades as a flight attendant on private jets, Lori has encountered it all. There was a pot-bellied pig that took a plane ride by itself, a celebrity’s guard dog that bit a member of the crew, and a British footballer who asked if he could change his knickers. “He got butt-ass naked right there in front of me,” said Lori, who asked to be identified only by her first name.

That wasn’t her only run-in with the footballer. On another trip, he boarded his plane in New York after spending the night partying with his wife. As Lori made her way to the athlete’s cabin, his assistant asked her to stop. “They’re shagging in the back,” the assistant said. She shrugged and stayed out of the way.

“I don’t think that’s inappropriate personally, because this is literally their flying home,” she told The Daily Beast. “They pay millions and millions of dollars. If I was them, and I was paying that amount of money, and I wanted to shag my husband, I would do it.”

Such is the life of a flight attendant for the ultra-rich, where customers pay anywhere from thousands of dollars for a single charter to millions for a full-time share of an aircraft. The variance in passengers’ behavior is just as wide.

Attendants divulged a host of wild accounts to us—from outlandish tips to lascivious escapades. Most spoke under the condition of anonymity, since they signed non-disclosure agreements and feared compromising their relationships with clients and employers.  READ MORE