Passengers were forced to endure blazing sunlight during a 14-hour flight after the electronic window dimming system failed on one side of the plane. The incident happened on a British Airways flight from Tokyo to London.
Sunshine glared through the windows after a malfunction of the system across the entire length of one side of the aircraft. “The automatic window dimmers on our side of the cabin were not functioning correctly, leaving us exposed to bright daylight for much of the flight,” one of the passengers who was on the flight explained in a Facebook post. Trying to block out the sun, the passenger used a safety card to prop up against the window.
The pilots and cabin crew reportedly knew the window dimmers weren’t working before the plane departed and had called engineers in an attempt to fix the issue.
Upon inspecting the issue, engineers were not able to get the dimmer switches working and so advised the low-tech alternative of using tray liners as mock window shades.
The tray liners were stuck over the windows with sticky tape.
However, the passenger said the temporary solution did not work and she had to use the safety card in an attempt to get some rest.
Manual window shades are not a feature of the plane, and instead, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner has an electronic window system.
The dimming system uses electrochromic technology which sends an electric current through a special transparent gel that’s sandwiched between two panels within the window.
By increasing the voltage running through the gel, the window quickly transitions from fully transparent to dark.
Express.co.uk has contacted British Airways for comment.
