[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 68 (Thursday, May 26, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: May 26, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                     AIRLINER CABIN AIR QUALITY ACT

                                 ______


                         HON. JAMES L. OBERSTAR

                              of minnesota

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, May 25, 1994

  Mr. OBERSTAR. Mr. Speaker, today I have introduced the Airliner Cabin 
Air Quality Act of 1994, to prohibit smoking on international flights 
to and from the United States. Congress banned smoking on all domestic 
flights of 6 hours or less in 1990. However, smoking remained permitted 
on U.S. carriers on international flights, and most foreign carriers 
serving the United States permit smoking as well.
  On May 18, 1994, the Subcommittee on Aviation, which I chair, held a 
full day of hearings on airliner cabin air quality. While there are 
many concerns about the overall quality of the air, the single most 
effective--and cost-free--action that we can take is to ban smoking on 
international flights.
  Most persuasive to the subcommittee at this hearing, as at our 
previous one, was the testimony of flight attendants, who are forced to 
spend their working lives aboard aircraft. Our flight attendant 
witnesses detailed ailments which they and their colleagues incur in 
the small, enclosed, smoke-filled cabin environment. They described 
health problems ranging from eye, nose and throat irritation, headache, 
nausea, dizziness, blurred vision, shortness of breath, and heart 
palpitations to permanent disability and even death from the 
occupational hazards of their jobs in airplanes. Nonsmoking flight 
attendants are suffering and dying from diseases common to smokers--
simply from working in the smoking section.
  There is also a safety issue involved. Flight attendant witnesses 
showed us photographs of cigarette butts all over the floor of the 
airplane--a potential fire hazard. They testified to passengers falling 
asleep in their seats, dropping lighted cigarettes on the floor--a 
clear fire risk.
  Equally outrageous is the plight of children stuck in the smoking 
section with their parents. And businessmen who must be at their peak 
when they arrive at their destination, but stagger off, jet-lagged and 
debilitated by smoke-caused allergies and sensitivities. And pleasure 
travellers whose vacations are ruined by smoke-induced illnesses. And 
the millions of nonsmoking passengers who cannot really get away from 
the smoke, no matter where they sit in the airplane.
  Mr. Speaker, the International Civil Aviation Organization [ICAO] has 
proposed that nations end smoking on aircraft in 1996. This is a 
proposal only, and unless all countries agree, passengers and flight 
attendants will continue to suffer, and airlines forced to go 
nonsmoking will maintain that they are at a competitive disadvantage.
  Airlines serving the United States, whether carrying the U.S. flag or 
some other, would under my bill be smoke-free. There would thus be no 
competitive disadvantage between U.S. and foreign airlines, and I 
believe that the airlines themselves as well as the vast majority of 
their employees and passengers will welcome enactment of this bill.

                          ____________________