I am travelling with my 15 month old daughter to london this summer. We are travelling on BA business class ans the journey is 7 hours and 45 minutes. My daughter weights around 13 kgs so will she need her own seat or will she be ok with the bassinet provided by the airline?

The website for BA has great information on this subject. Here is just a little bit that I found. I highly suggest you calling BA and advising them of your infant. Also make sure you have proper traveling documents for your child.
Question
Do I have to buy a seat for my infant? What inflight amenities do you provide for my baby?

Answer
Passengers traveling with infants under the age of two may choose to either:

1). Purchase an infant fare (10% of adult fare) which would require the infant to share the adult seat.

or

2). Purchase a seat at a child's fare which would allow the use of a car seat (infant must be between 6-23 months of age).

British Airways offer bassinet seating for those passengers traveling with infants and purchasing an infant fare. These bassinet seats are available to accommodate an infant up to six months of age. In addition, we have recently introduced a new seat, used in conjunction with the current bassinets, which accommodates infants between the ages of six months and twenty three months. These seats may be requested at the time of booking as they are limited and subject to availability.


On the ground
When booking your flight, please advise your booking agent if there's a child travelling with you and give their age. Children's meals should be requested when booking, or no later than 24 hours before departure. On arrival at the airport, our ground staff will be delighted to give extra help should you need it and families with small children will be invited to board first. Feel free to bring your pushchair right to the side of the aircraft for added convenience (excluding transfer passengers).

It is hard to keep a 15 months old baby restrained in a bassinet....I have a 17 months old grandaughter, and believe me she is Full of energy, always on the go, sometimes it is hard to keep up with her..

Absolutely buy her own seat, on two counts:

1. a 15-month old is a major squirmy being and stuffing her into a bassinet designed for infants will work for about 15 seconds. She is already walking, presumably, and will want out the minute she figures out what you have in mind; and having your lap as alternative isn't going to work very well, either. If you don't believe me, try sitting in your living room for 7 hrs. and 45 minutes holding her in your lap. Won't work. And if she has her own seat, you have your hands free to handle toys, books, crayons, food for/with her, and she's less likely to want to howl or bolt into the aisle. You can only count on her sleeping for just so long on such a routine-disrupting trip.

2. Imagine holding a priceless crystal vase filled with water weighing 13 kgs. in your lap during heavy turbulence. A good jolt could send it flying, no matter how hard you try to hang on. You surely don't want to risk a bump on your daughter's head if not much worse in case of unexpected emergency. Ever hear those stories where "a few passengers suffered injuries" when a jet hits clear-air turbulence that drops it thousands of feet in a matter of seconds? The injured passengers were the ones out of their seats or unbelted. Do you want one of those passengers to be your daughter?

Why take the chance of injury and why inflict inappropriate accommodations on your lively young girl?

This is a long flight. Do you really want to be stuck holding a baby on your lap for almost 8 hours non-stop?

Bassinet doesnt' sound very safe to me. Remember that crash where the top of the jet came off? You know who died? All the children not strapped in. Now you may think there is not much likelyhood of something like that happening, but if it were my child, I'd pay for a seat and bring a long a car seat and strap her in. In fact I did that when my baby was only 3 weeks old, even though I didn't need to buy her a seat.

Now let's not get mommy2becky all frantic about the top of the jet coming off. This is supposed to be vacation, right?
I never bought a seat for my kids when I wasn't required to (<2) and the reasons were purely economic. If money had not been a consideration, I would have bought a seat when they hit about 8 months. It's just much more comfortable and convenient.
On the other hand, you don't have to hold her in your lap for the entire flight. With a little luck, she will sleep, and you can put her in a bassinet-type bed, or she can sleep on the floor (horrors!). Or you can walk her around for a while, or maybe there will even be an extra seat available in BC. Good luck; you'll probably both have fun.

mommy2becky,

Didn't you post recently about traveling to Europe with your toddler and a nanny? It sounds as if you're a family of more than modest means. Why on earth wouldn't you purchase a seat for your toddler? I'm sure you (and the other passengers) will be much more comfortable if your child has her own seat.

mommy2becky,

In the name of 99.99999% of all business class travelers:
Please save money and your co-travelers' sanity by buying an extra seat for your daughter and booking yourselves in (premium) ECONOMY!!

Business class passengers have payed a lot for a little peace and quiet - please don't deprive them of that.

I know it's not nice, but someone had to say it

Andre

Hmm, flying biz class with husband, toddler, and 5 month pregnant self with a nanny who'll undoubtedly be in coach. Also traveling to Paris via Eurostar (1st class?) but possibly adding Edinburgh, Brussels and Geneva to the itin. If becky's mom and dad can afford all that (including the nanny) then just buy the kid a seat and claim the extra miles. I smell a troll.

Mommy2becky has stated that she is travelling business class so I don't think it's a question of her not being able to afford a seat unless she is balking at paying around $6,000 for another business class seat for a 15 month old. A 15 month old should have her own seat, either in economy or business.

There was an interesting article in USAToday recently on this very subject

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/...afe-side_x.htm

Limited quote "One man sailed across the aisle. A baby flew out of her mother's arms. Passengers safely caught the baby, but the mother unbuckled her seatbelt and flew into the ceiling. The blow knocked her unconscious and broke four of her ribs."

This was turbulance caused by pilot error, but....

Of course she needs a seat- for safety.

"Mommy," you have certainly heard some compelling comments and I hope you heed them. You will all have a much better trip.

(As for Andre, no, no one "had" to say it, and no, it wasn't nice; and having a Business Class ticket doesn't ever say "no kids," any more than it says "no loudmouths, drinkers, people with too much perfume, people with a pesky cough, or other travelers found to be distasteful to Andre.&quot

Mommy, if business class is to expensive, switch to cattle class.. A baby deserve to be comfortable and safe also..Years ago I travelled by myself with two children, 6 month old daughter and 3 years old son, from New york to Rome...Of course, being a young mom I could not afford business class, therefore i did not have a choice but travel in cattle, but i made certain that my kids were safe and comfortable.. and believe me it was a long trip for me also..

I wonder since you're going in business class it's likely you may have an empty seat next to you.

It is highly unlikely that there will be an empty seat in business class. We flew business class to Italy in April and it was full. Many people hoping for an upgrade and willing to pay for one or use miles for one couldn't get an upgrade. If there are any unsold business class seats, the airline is going to upgrade their best customers rather than leave it empty so that someone who isn't going to buy a seat for her kid can use it for free.

Thanks, Cassandra. "Someone had to say it!"

Gee when I worked for the airlines I was always thrilled to have little ones on board..many times they were better behaved then many of the adult passengers...at least many of them would say Thank You and Yes Ma'am....

I'd rethink the bassinet idea. We took our then 12 month old to Europe last summer, in business class with the bassinet, on Continental. The bassinet is really more for a younger child and once they are capable of sitting up, it'll be tough to keep them in it. (You might also want to check the weight restriction, as your child may be bumping up against it.)

My wife and I had the bulk head seats and were able to set up a little play area on the floor in front of us. That definately made him happier as you could manuever a bit.

As we found the bassinet to be a problem, within 1 minute of putting him in, we found that the seat was more than sufficiently wide for my son to snuggle up next to my wife when he slept. On our return flight, we didn't even bother with it.

One other suggestion, we purchased a few new toys before we left so that he'd have something to hold his interest. We also took a few of his favorite toys out of his room a few weeks before, so that they'd be "fresh" again for the plane.