Air bags can lessen injury during flight turbulence

Strong injuries from air turbulence don't happen that often, but when they do happen they can be severe. On a flight from Rio de Janeiro to Texas, people were "thrown to the roof as if they were dolls" and some feared for their lives when a Continental Airlines flight ran into turbulence, shaken passengers said. What about installing air bags at the top of the passengers' seats? Grave injury can occur when the heads bumps suddenly and with force into hard plastic, like in a car accident. The air bags will be programmed to open within nano-seconds of a sudden drop in altitude and could help save lives. If it's too expensive or hard to design air bags for this purpose, covering the space with pillows or other soft shock-absorbing material would be preferable to hitting the head on hard plastic.

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