Malaysia Airlines has announced no kids in first class, will Ryanair ban all kids from some of their flights too?

Recently Malaysia Airlines announced they would no longer allow babies to fly in their first class cabins on Boeing 747-400s and Airbus A380s when they go into service. This comes after complaints by first class passengers, who pay a pretty penny, not wanting to hear screaming kids during their flight. The airline has stated they have tried noise cancelling headphones, but passengers wanted the baby-ban. The airline still plans to allow babies in business and economy class seats.

Ryanair also recently announced they would start offering child-free flights this October. However, they announced the new flights right before April’s Fools and they have not officially announced one way or another if they will actually be offering the flights.

On the other side of the spectrum, I just got an email in my inbox this morning from Qatar Airways stating that two kids can fly for free (plus taxes and surcharges) with one adult. It doesn’t appear to be directly related to Malaysia Airlines not allowing babies to fly, but it is pretty good timing.

Reading many of the comments on the internet after Ryanair’s announcement and even more recently after Malaysia Airlines’ baby-ban statement, there seems to be a lot of popularity behind not allowing or restricting children from flying. Personally I do not have my own kids, nor am I a big fan of screaming kids on an airline, but it almost seems that is just part of living in a society — being around kids.

I am curious to get your thoughts and figured it is about time for another poll (Note: if you are reading this on the Seattle PI or Reuters synidcation, you will have to go to https://www.airlinereporter.com to vote):

[poll id=”5″]

If an airline outright banned all kids, there would probably be a huge backlash , even though it seems most people do not want kids on their flight. An airline like Ryanair might be able to get away with it, but look at all the attention Malaysia Airlines received just from banning kids from first class on only two aircraft type. We will have to wait until October to see if Ryanair’s promises of child-free flights was true or just another marketing ploy and I would suspect many other airlines around the world are watching how the Malaysian ban will work out.

Images: David Barrie and ffc57