For weary travellers, the journey from touchdown to taxi can feel endless, but a surge in poor passenger etiquette is making the final stretch even more frustrating. The latest target of frequent flyers' ire is the so-called 'aisle lice' – those who leap from their seats the moment the seatbelt sign dings off, clogging the cabin in a desperate bid to deplane first.
The Battle of the Airborne Pests
This new term follows the infamous 'gate lice' phenomenon, which became so problematic that in 2024, American Airlines took measures to manage pushy passengers trying to skip boarding queues, using alarms and alerts for gate agents. Now, the focus has shifted from the jet bridge to the cabin aisle. The debate ignited on a Reddit thread last year that asked, "Who do [we] hate more? Gate lice or aisle lice?" after an incident on a flight from Minneapolis to New York.
One first-class passenger recounted how fellow travellers, including a window-seat passenger, shoved forward to be first off. The consensus among seasoned flyers was clear: aisle lice are "exponentially worse". "Aisle lice slow things down, delay people and cause so many more headaches," one commenter stated. Another insisted, "If you don't have a tight connection or any other 'emergency', then wait your turn to get off the plane."
Chaos in the Cabin and a Protocol Ignored
The disruption caused by these eager exiters is not just theoretical. In October, a passenger on a Frontier Airlines flight caused chaos by blocking the aisle as others tried to disembark in Baltimore, Maryland. According to the Daily Mail, fellow travellers demanded she move, but she refused to budge.
The universally accepted protocol for leaving an aircraft is to disembark row by row from the front after gathering your belongings. However, many social media users argue that airlines themselves are partly to blame for not actively discouraging the aisle lice behaviour onboard, allowing the stressful free-for-all to persist.
Part of a Wider Trend of Travel Fads
The term 'aisle lice' joins a lexicon of travel trends that gained notoriety in 2024. Alongside gate lice, flyers contended with 'raw dogging' – a TikTok-inspired trend where passengers forego all in-flight entertainment, including screens, music, snacks, and sleep on long-haul journeys.
Another category is the 'check-in chicken', travellers who delay selecting a seat until the last minute, gambling to snag coveted extra-legroom or exit-row seats. As air travel continues to rebound, these social phenomena highlight the ongoing tension between personal convenience and collective courtesy at 35,000 feet.
