r/news • u/Big-Heron4763 • 5d ago

Passenger ordered to pay more than $5,000 in fuel costs after flight diverted due to bad behavior

https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/13/travel/australian-airline-passenger-fine-cost-fuel-intl-hnk/index.html
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u/TobaccoAficionado 5d ago

It's funny, because people got a glimpse, but they didn't get the full picture of how delicate it all is. To cripple the entire united state's infrastructure, truckers would have to stop driving for 3 days. It would cause literally trillions of dollars in damage. The entire US would take months to recover. We saw shit go down to like 80% efficiency, but we didn't see it stop. It would be really really bad if it stopped.

The more efficient you make a system, the more delicate that system becomes. Our system is extremely efficient, there is very little waste. Things have to function exactly as intended, or the whole thing fucking collapses.

It really is scary.

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u/CaptainPitkid 5d ago

It's fascinating how much this affected the mindset of the current generation. Like our great grandparents were affected by the great depression and it permanently altered the way they handled life. Now we have the lockdowns and shortages and more and it just permanently changes how we consider the world around us.

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u/esines 5d ago

I remember my grandma being obsessively insistant about us grandkids eating enough. Thought it was nothing more than default behavior for grandmas and never considered why. Learned later she grew up food insecure in the great depression as a child of a single mother with 3 kids. She fondly recalled Christmases when they recieved an orange as a stocking gift. AN orange, for them to split amongst each other.

She also was a bit of a hoarder. Could not bring herself to ever throw a single thing away even past the point it had become burdensome.

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u/Drink-my-koolaid 5d ago edited 5d ago

Aw, God bless her. My Baba was the same. Even if you weren't hungry, you forced that soup and sandwich down to make her happy!

edit: Also, I think the Sydney Airport traffic control should totally turn that swirly thing on the tower to a slide that you go down on those burlap sacks. That would be fun after a stressful day at work!