No More Peanuts on Southwest

Interesting - we got peanuts going to Florida but pretzels coming home yesterday. Just assumed someone was allergic on our flight. Maybe they made the change already (or there was an allergy).
 




This won't be a popular opinion but I just don't think its right that one persons allergies effects everyone on board. There is people who are allergic to lots of stuff. I bet there is at least 10 people on every flight allergic to something. What if your allergic to dogs and someone has one? What if your allergic to coffee? I just don't think its right for everyone to not be allowed to get peanuts just because of a few people. Honestly they should have just got rid of them and not said anything and nobody would have been the wiser.
 
I'm not sure I get the point when people can bring any type of food onto the plane themselves. Things like trail mix, granola bars, and peanut butter crackers seem quite popular for traveling. I guess it will lessen the likelihood a little, but I always worry these sort of bans will create an unrealistic expectation of safety and have some people taking less precautions.
 
Based on my experiences, I thought they'd already discontinued peanuts. The last several times I've flown Southwest, the flight attendants have come around with a big basket with about 5 different choices of snacks. Peanuts weren't one of the choices. If the flight wasn't too full, they might let you choose 2 different snacks. I thought it was great! Between that and the fact that they serve Dr Pepper, it's Southwest for me!
 
We love peanuts but the fact that people can and do die of peanut allergies and 1 epi pen isn’t usually enough to stop a reaction long enough to get a person from a plane to a hospital is enough for me to be ok with the change. A whole plane of people eating peanuts makes a much bigger chance of a reaction. I have been on SW flights where we were told a severe peanut allergy person is in a row near us and they asked all people in those rows to not eat peanut products if we had them. We did have granola bars with peanuts. We didn’t eat them. I know peanut allergy people/parents are very aware that an airline stopping serving peanuts isn’t going to ensure safety. You will meet no greater detective than a parent of a severe allergy kid. They scrutinize everything and meticulously clean everything that could possibly be contaminated with the allergin. We were actually surprised they served peanuts on our last outgoing flight. (And happy cause we love peanuts).
 
This won't be a popular opinion but I just don't think its right that one persons allergies effects everyone on board. There is people who are allergic to lots of stuff. I bet there is at least 10 people on every flight allergic to something. What if your allergic to dogs and someone has one? What if your allergic to coffee? I just don't think its right for everyone to not be allowed to get peanuts just because of a few people. Honestly they should have just got rid of them and not said anything and nobody would have been the wiser.

Want peanuts? Bring your own.
 
Yeah until they take them out of the airports and stop letting you bring them on board at all.

Slippery slope fallacy, but even if that's true ... there are TONS of other things to eat. People will not starve. I think asking people not to eat peanuts for like three hours so others don't potentially go into anaphylactic shock is a pretty reasonable request.
 
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I'm really happy to read this. We flew a couple of weeks ago and I was amazed at how well SW handled the peanut situation.

I noted my DS's allergy online at the time I made our reservations, and while we had a fairly early flight going to WDW, I knew that when we were flying home, it could be an issue because it was a late afternoon flight.

When we checked in for our flight going to WDW, we were given pre-board authorization (for my DS and one other person), but since all 4 of us had EBCI and our boarding position was around A-30, I decided it wasn't necessary and just cleaned our area when we got on. There was actually a peanut between my seat and my DS's, but I just wedged a clorox wet wipe over it. Also, they gave me a card to hand to the flight attendant when we boarded, just to ensure that they didn't hand out peanuts and that they handed out pretzels instead.

On the way coming back, since we did RAC at our resort and didn't need to check our bags at the airport, I asked at the gate about that card to hand to the flight attendant. She was beyond accommodating and said we could all pre-board even though I told her we didn't have to do that. We had around A-30 again, but since she insisted all 4 of us pre-board, I took her up on it. While I expected to see more peanuts strewn around on this flight given the time of day, it was actually pretty spotless (still cleaned the area, of course).

The pretzels they serve actually have a cross-contamination warning, so they're not safe to consume for peanut/tree-nut allergic people, but they're not going to have a reaction from someone else eating them. Granted, people can still bring what they want onto the plane, but the fact that 75%+ of the people on the flight or previous flights aren't eating peanuts is huge in my book!
 
This won't be a popular opinion but I just don't think its right that one persons allergies effects everyone on board. There is people who are allergic to lots of stuff. I bet there is at least 10 people on every flight allergic to something. What if your allergic to dogs and someone has one? What if your allergic to coffee? I just don't think its right for everyone to not be allowed to get peanuts just because of a few people. Honestly they should have just got rid of them and not said anything and nobody would have been the wiser.

I am with you 100%. There are all sorts of allergies out there, food and other items. Do we all demand that when we go out in public that these areas are allergen free and cater to everything and everyone.....of course not, so why are planes any different? I don't eat often on planes, but when I do it is usually a nut mix/granola mix/cracker with nuts in it. Protein is great and these things pack easily into my backpack. Definitely First World Problems....
 

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