I am fat. I sometimes have to use a seatbelt extension, sometimes not. In Europe I am not allowed to sit in the exit row if I require an extension. This strikes me as a fair and objective criteria and if the airline asked me to move I would do so without complaint. The link provided by Cortney proves the opposite of the case intended. In fact, the wide degree of discretion allowed under that regulation suggests that if a carrier decided to ban people from this aisle on the grounds of obesity they would be fine.
The underlying issue in this complaint is the impact people like me have on other passengers. If I am travelling, I am generally with my partner. I ask always for a window seat, my partner sits next to me, so we don't intrude on any other passenger. When travelling alone, I prefer to buy an extra seat. It can be difficult to do this on some airlines.. One told me I could buy another seat, but they couldn't guarantee that they would be together!!
The seats and space is getting smaller whilst people are getting taller and fatter. This should be regulated and I do consider the constricted space does represent a potential safety hazard. There was a crash by a commuter plane at CLT which resulted, in part, because the standard assumptions of the average weight of passengers was so out of date. Equally, the evacuations times used in aircraft certified many years ago should be looked at again. Cramming passengers in like sardines is not safe.
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