On long-haul flights, both flight attendants and pilots need to take breaks. Yet airplane designers are of course forced to cram cabin crew rest areas into confined spaces, to leave more room for revenue-generating passenger seats. So how do they manage it, and what do these spaces look like?
Crew Rest Compartments, or CRCs, vary in design from plane to plane. Boeing's enormous 787 has this pimpish loft space nestled above the passenger compartment, where up to five flight attendants can catch some shuteye:
The photo above is of the space as it exists in an actual airplane. If we look at the design-phase mockups, below, we can see the designers initially had a slightly different idea: In addition to the cleaner, clutter-free surfaces, the place is well-stocked with pillows in an effort to promote cabin-crew pillow fights.
The pilots have their own separate sleeping compartment. It features the same privacy curtains suspended from ceiling-mounted tracks that you see in the flight attendants' bunk room.
In this photo, shot by The Flying Engineer, we see the 6'3" Captain Pat Bearce is able to stretch out in one of these comfortably.
