By Andrew Liszewski
The longest flight I’ve ever had was only about 9 hours long and even though it was great to have a shower when we landed, I was more than able to endure the trip without needing to take one at 30,000 feet.
However Boeing seems to feel that in-flight showering is something passengers will want so they commissioned an 11 person team to find a feasible way to pull it off. You see carrying enough water to facilitate everyone on board taking a shower is just too much extra weight. (You’ve seen how small the drinking water cups are on a plane.)
The solution is an in-flight shower system with special nozzles that turn a small amount of water into a large amount of mist.
The shower unit is a watertight cylinder with very fine nozzles all around. As the traveller steps inside, an optical sensor measures their height and shape and pumps water mixed with shampoo at high pressure through only those nozzles needed to cover the body.
The resulting very fine mist is electrically ionised as it leaves the nozzles and is therefore attracted to the earthed body ? so no misty water is wasted. The nozzles then emit a mist of pure water, for rinsing, followed by warm air for drying.
I have to admit the idea does sound pretty cool, but I find it awkward enough just using an airplane bathroom let alone taking a full shower.