Why is there no row 13 on a plane?

Superstition around numbers influences the omission of row 13 on Ryanair and Lufthansa flights, as well as other airlines like Air France and Virgin Atlantic. The number 13 is considered bad luck in various cultures, leading to its avoidance in many aspects of everyday life, including airline seat numbering.



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We used to skip 33 on certain maps to make the [final] row standardized, but the end row is no longer standardized, a United Airlines spokesperson told Travel + Leisure. In short, the reasoning behind having a unanimous seating map is a math equation of sorts.

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“Rows 13 and 17 are missing because these are considered unlucky numbers #bettersafethansorry,” Lufthansa said in a 2017 tweet, accompanied by a wink emoji. United Airlines doesn't have a row 13 or 14 either, with row 14 considered unlucky as it sounds like “will die” in Chinese.

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This might be anywhere from around row 7 to row 15, though, depending on the airline. On some Airbus A320s, particularly the newer A320neo versions, the last row of the cabin may not have a window.

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7 isn't the best row to be seated in on a flight. And the worst isn't row 13. According to flight-comparison web site Skyscanner, the very best seat on a flight is 6A. The web site came to this conclusion via a survey of more than 1,000 people on the subject of seat preferences.

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Runway numbers are determined by rounding the compass bearing of one runway end to the nearest 10 degrees and truncating the last digit, meaning runways are numbered from 1 to 36—as per the diagram below. The opposite end of the runway always differs by 180 degrees, so it's numbered 18 higher or lower.

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While it's shocking and strange, it's far from the first time an aircraft has seemed to vanish off the face of the Earth: since 1948, some 83 aircraft have been declared “missing,” according to data compiled by the Aviation Safety Network.

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The reason planes cruise at high altitudes is that they burn less fuel and can fly faster, as the air is less dense. At 30,000 feet and higher, it is also possible for aircraft to avoid weather systems, making it more comfortable onboard.

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