hand signals

They all have their own special meaning

Frequent flyers might know what we’re talking about: those funny hand signals cabin crew exchange with each other. People started wondering about their meaning back in May, when someone posted a video of a flight attendant who seemed to do a short version of the chicken dance. Turns out, it’s a secret code! And EasyJet has now revealed what it means…

Chicken dance
In May of this year, Jamie East, a TV and radio presenter, spotted what seemed like a weird chicken dance on board an EasyJet flight. He filmed the incident and posted the video on Twitter:

.@easyjet excuse me but please explain what ON EARTH is going on here?! pic.twitter.com/hnhuWikojI

— Jamie East (@jamieeast) 9 May 2017

In the video you can see two flight attendants exchanging a signal that resembles the chicken dance, and people were confounded by it. What does this mean?! It turns out that the flight attendant was asking her colleague for a chicken caesar baguette!

Secret code
EasyJet has shared a video in which two flight attendants explain some of the signals and why they use them. Although it’s only now being paid attention to, the secret code has been around for 21 years already! It’s all about efficiency: by using the hand signals, the cabin crew can serve the passengers much quicker while keeping the chatter to a minimum. The main goal is to make sure that everyone has an enjoyable flight!

There are signals for on board orders, but they also have signals for special situations. We’ve listed a few of them below, along with their meaning!