On my trip to Minnesota last month I was pleased when the seatbelt fit me with four or five inches to spare.  I hadn’t flown in several years and the last time I’d flown I’d needed the belt extender.  However, on the return trip I was concerned that the belt was pretty snug.  I wondered how I’d gained four inches without having to buy new clothes (and how I’d done all this in the course of just one week!).  This morning when I got on the plane the seatbelt fit with four or five inches to spare again.  I’m certain that I didn’t lose that much weight in the last five or six weeks.

The only conclusion I can come to now is that each plane has seatbelts with different lengths.  The first image that came to mind was an aircraft mechanic or assembly-line worker eyeballing the belts and cutting them to his whim.  But then I started putting things together and came to the conclusion that newer planes and older planes with new seats have longer seatbelts than the older ones (these were all Super 80’s, which seem to be the bulk of American’s fleet; the seats and the labelling on the tray-tables lead me to think that the first and last S80 I was on were newer than the middle one).  Of course, this is all supposition as to whether this is the case, but I do know that I’m not fluctuating four or five inches between flights.