On an apprx 50 seat regional jet, I was asked to move from the back to the front of the plane "for reasons of weight and balance". I weigh about 110. I wasn't the only one chuckling as I moved.

Patrick, i would have been one of the first to volunteer to get off!

As others have said, balance is important as weight. I know of one case where a pilot of a medium sized prop airplane loaded a set of boxed encyclopedias in the rear baggage section of his plane. The plane was well under the allowable gross weight but, when he took off, the aircraft balance was so far out of acceptable range that he was unable to lower the nose and the aircraft stalled and crashed.

Be thankful the airline personnel are paying attention to weight and balance, no matter the size of the airplane. Not only are they required to, it is for your and their safety.

They might also have a built-in variable that adds so-many pounds of luggage per passenger, so they might actually have been trying to save 160 lbs. in theory, regardless of whether she actually had 35 lbs. of carryon + checked luggage. Let us not forget, also, the CYA theory of approving a plane for take-off.

DH once flew on flapping-wing aircraft from Provinceton to Boston and caused a delay because his carry-on briefcase turned out to be too heavy for under-plane storage -- had to be placed in the nose under the cockpit, and they tried first the right and then the left side before they were satisfied that the plane would fly right. A little unnerving to watch that, esp. since the pilot wore a mini-skirt and cracked her gum while she ordered 3 pizzas from a place in Boston for her to pick up and carry back for lunch.

I had an interesting experience once flying a turbo-prop flight by Aero Mapiex in Panama.

Before boarding, everyone was asked their weight, their baggage was weighed, and all carry-on items were weighed. I had never seen so much attention being paid to the total weight of each passenger!

Have fun!
Mark
www.tiogringo.com

funny story, I am not making up:

I read about a guy who was transporting a bunch of goats - I remember he said it was 800 pounds of cargo (goats). I don't remember how big his plane was, it was a small prop plane but at least big enough for cargo - just the pilot and co-pilot seat.

When in the air, the goats all clustered around him and starting chewing on the seat, him, his hair, anything they could get near. He got so p'o'ed he did something scary (I can't remember what now) and they all freaked out and ran to the back of the plane. Needless to say, this is bad news - 800 pounds of goats at the back of the plane. So he had to somehow coax them back to him again, and fast! And he couldn't chance scaring them off again.

He landed just fine, but they had eaten his shirt and the upholstery on his seats. But at least he landed!

Now that's funny!

OK, get ready for this. A former drama student of mine used to be the stage manager for Seifried and Roy and did their international tour -- much of which was in Japan. Then they flew back to the states to perform it at Radio City Music Hall. One transport plane was for the elephant. The story is you can't sedate an elephant for very long so they had to allow it to stand fastened in from all sides. You know how an elephant sways when irritated? They say there was a man with a loaded gun ready to shoot and kill the elephant, should it start to sway, as that would cause the plane to plummet. They couldn't shoot it with a tranquilizer in case if started swaying, because any tranquilizer would take too long to take effect. Fortunately the elephant never got agitated or swayed.

How do you keep a tethered elephant happy?

Free drinks and buckets of peanuts? Movies on a private DVD player? Maybe let him watch Dumbo?

Great story, flygirl! I have traveled around the islands with everything from KFC and Burger King to live chickens, to tires, to fresh lobster, and every household item imaginable.....but NEVER live goats. What a story. I do have to admit that I have experience with goats clustering like that when they are freaked, but haven't seen it happen on an aircraft. :D And, I'm not sure I'd care to see it happen either.