What are ‘aisle lice’? The latest travel term for annoying passengers on flights
What are ‘aisle lice’? The latest travel term for annoying passengers on flights
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There’s a new name for passengers itching to exit the cabin. Between landing, deplaning, baggage claim and customs, it can be a lengthy wait from touchdown to your taxi – and poor etiquette from impatient air travellers is on the rise. As American Airlines moves to squash “gate lice” – pushy passengers trying to skip the boarding process – with alarm sounds and alerts for gate agents, a new pest has been named onboard.
“Aisle lice”, the new travel term for those who quickly unbuckle and queue down the cabin in a bid to deplane first, tend to shoot out of their seats once the seatbelt sign is turned off. Now, frequent flyers are debating which of the two annoying air travellers is worse to fly with.
The first-class passenger wrote: “Not only do the two people next to me decide to stand up but somehow the guy from the window seat shoves his way forward and is the first of all of us to get off the plane.”. Social media users largely agreed that the eager exiters are “exponentially worse” than their gate lice predecessors.
“If you don't have a tight connection or any other ‘emergency’ then wait your turn to get off the plane,” said one flyer. Another added: “Aisle lice slow things down, delay people and cause so much more headaches.”. Several commenters blamed the airlines for not discouraging the behaviour onboard.
The aisle lice nickname follows a wave of travel trends last year, including gate lice, “raw dogging,” and the “check-in chicken.”. “Rawdogging”, a TikTok travel trend, requires plane passengers to sit silently and screen-free on long-haul stints in the sky.
