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What’s the safest seat on a plane?
Steven Lawkowski, Albany, NY
“Safest” might be stretching it, unless you’re talking about a once-in-a-lifetime “miracle on the Hudson.” “All crashes are different, and there’s no way to prepare for one based on your seat,” says Matt Daimler, founder of seatguru.com. But in 2007 the nerds at Popular Mechanics studied every commercial jet crash in the U.S. since 1971 that had fatalities and survivors. PM found that passengers near the tail are 40 percent more likely to survive than those in first class. Great, but being “alive” isn’t worth sitting near the bathrooms while someone furiously pounds out his membership in the “solo mile-high club.” We mean you, Popular Mechanics staffers!