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Einstein solves airplane boarding problem

James Randerson

AS YOU board your flight, the fabric of space-time is probably the last thing on your mind. But research suggests that by harnessing the maths behind Einstein's theory of relativity, airlines could speed up the arduous process of boarding.

According to New Scientist magazine, which reported the research on Thursday, it is the first practical application of Einstein's work outside physics. And the researchers are in talks with a major airline, which wants to use their ideas.

"Enplaning," as the airlines rather extravagantly call it, can be done in a variety of ways. You can line everyone up so that they are in seat order before they board, or opt for the more familiar back third first strategy. Alternatively there's the budget airlines' every-man-woman-and-child-for-themselves option.

Eitan Bachmat and his colleagues at Ben-Gurion University in Israel set up a computer model of their own version of space-time to model the departure hall drudgery. Instead of the usual three space dimensions and one time dimension their departure lounge universe has just two — passengers' row numbers and their places in the boarding queue when it first forms. Each passenger is a point in space-time. They only dealt with the scenario of passengers with assigned seats, not the budget airline "survival of the fittest" approach.

They found that boarding from the back was no better than letting passengers queue at random. The problem is that while the fat lady in seat 80a is hunting for her travel pillow, she is stopping everyone else in the row sitting down. "Congestion is the major issue," said Dr. Bachmat. So what does work? "You could do better by controlling every passenger, but people don't like being bossed around too much."

Dr. Bachmat said he now always has something to do on boring flights. "Each time I board an aeroplane I just watch how people behave," he said. "It keeps the mind distracted." —

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

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