Firstly, the headline of the article isn't strictly true. The young girl was not turned away from the flight rather given the option to buy a seat for her violin or put the instrument in the hold.
I'm surprised that Ryanair customer service had told the traveller that they'd be able to take a violin as hand luggage. This certainly wasn't the case when I recently travelled with them; they didn't really seem to know what I was talking about.
I'd like to point out right away that I am in no way supporting Ryanair's policy on travelling with musical instruments but if you have to use this dreadful airline to travel, you have to play the game.
I travelled to Salzburg with my quartet. For various reasons, Ryanair was the only airline we could fly with for the time we wanted to arrive. BA were in the middle of strike season and Easyejt, marginally more sympathetic with musicians, only flew to Munich where we would have to embark on a long train journey. Some research prior to the flight threw up some shocking stories. One which kept cropping up was the airline selling on your instruments' seat and asking you then to place your instrument in the overhead luggage hold! Small instruments like violins and most small/medium woodwind and brass instruments can happily fit in the overheads but our cheap and cheerful airline never miss a trick to fleece you out of your hard-earned cash. It seems that hand luggage is the one thing that Ryanair don't charge you for. Unless you're a musician. It's a disgrace.
Checking in and flight went surprisingly smoothly thanks to a large amount of research. Nevertheless, we still had to book SEVEN seats for four travellers. Of course, we had to book extra seats for our instruments. Except mine; my baritone sax sadly didn't make the journey. My fellow traveller had contacted Ryanair on my behalf before we booked our flights to enquire whether it would be possible for the sax to have an extra seat. We were told, and I exaggerate not, 'It can't be taller than a small man standing on a chair'.
Yes. A small man standing on a chair.
Hang on there a moment! How small is small? Leprechaun small? Is a small man larger than a tall child? Let's talk about the chair. An armchair? A stool? Needless to say, our response was in the realms of, 'Huh?'. Much to-ing and fro-ing occurred in the following minutes when finally the customer services representative came back to tell us that the instrument could be no taller than 50cm. At this point, my friend didn't quite know whether to laugh or cry. She diplomatically asked our friendly rep, 'how many men do you know that, when standing on a chair, are 50cm tall?'. Given that the other three instruments are over 50cm when stood up yet are allowed in the cabin led us to decide that there's no way we'd attempt to take my sax on board. Luckily, our contacts in Salzburg were able to negotiate an instrument from the local conservatoire but borrowing a sax is like driving someone else's car; it's usually ok but the nerves mean it's never entirely comfortable.
I'd like to point out at this juncture that when musicians do not want their instruments to go in the luggage hold it's not because we're being precious. Have you seen the care that luggage handlers take while moving suitcases? No, neither have I; there is none. Speak to any musician and they'll provide you with endless tales of damaged instruments due to careless luggage handing. No amount of 'Handle with Care' stickers will save you here. More importantly, there can be massive temperature fluctuations in the luggage hold and can quite easily drop below freezing. Wooden instruments, such as the string family and some woodwind instruments, can be damaged beyond repair from very slight temperature changes. By putting a violin in the hold of an aircraft you're essentially sending it to its grave. You might as well smash it up right now.
Musicians have a difficult time as it is. The arts are being cut left, right and centre and live music is becoming tougher and tougher to make a living from. Airlines such as Ryanair are basically taxing us for trying to make a living by forcing us to buy an extra seat for our instruments. Our passage was smooth because we played the game, we did thorough research beforehand and despite Ryanair's best efforts, had an easy flight. The important thing to remember is never travel with Ryanair unless you absolutely have to. Paying that little bit extra is worth every penny.
