Which seat works best with an in-cabin dog? [Southwest 737-700]
In an earlier post, I advised you to choose a middle seat, since they generally have the most room to stow a dog in a carrier. Not long afterwards, I encountered a middle seat under which I really couldn’t stow Chloe because a significant portion of the space was occupied by a box for electronics. Happily, this wasn’t a plane with one of those railings that cuts off a big chunk of the storage space under the aisle seat, so I stowed her under my husband’s feet.
It raised the point, though, that under-seat space varies by plane, and therefore choosing a seat for your flight with an in-cabin pet is more complicated than I first thought. I’ve started making notes about which seats, on which planes, best accommodate a pet in a carrier. This post is the first in the series. Keep in mind that most domestic and international airlines have rules about the maximum size of in-cabin pet carriers they allow on board (see Dog Jaunt’s handy charts under the “Guides” tab above).
Southwest 737 (-700 series)
Southwest has published its underseat dimensions, and I applaud them for doing so, but I don’t think their measurements tell the whole story. We just traveled on a couple of Southwest 737 (-700 series) planes, and here’s what I learned.
The plane has only one class of seats, so no need to worry about the dimensions under first/business class seats versus coach seats. There’s only one bulkhead, in front of the first row. It has no cut-out in the bottom, so you won’t be able to travel there, nor will you be able to travel in the exit row seats.
The middle seat was the best choice for a pet carrier, being a full 19″ wide. The window seat was slightly narrower — just shy of 18″ wide. The aisle seat had a railing that made it very narrow indeed — between 14″-15″ wide.
Comparing my measurements to Southwest’s published measurements, you’ll see that the window seat on our planes was wider than advertised. Perhaps Southwest’s 737s in other series (-300 and -500) have narrower window seats, and the airline chose to lump all the series together in its calculations.
This discussion of widths may seem pointless to you since the length measurement provided by Southwest (what I’d call “depth” — that is, measuring front to back under the seat) is 19″ for all of its seats, and surely that’s generous enough to cover most carriers. In my experience, though, a carrier inserted front-to-back under the seat pokes a few inches out into your legroom area, and flight attendants hate that.
You may get away with it — my neighbor on the last flight had a Bichon Frise in a huge Sherpa carrier under her seat, and did a remarkable job of concealing the fact that she had no leg room left by crossing her legs and draping a sweater casually over her knees — but be prepared for objections from flight attendants. To avoid them, choose a seat that can accommodate your carrier side-to-side — for most of us, that means the middle seat, or, if you’re lucky, the window seat.
Related posts:
- Which seat works best with an in-cabin dog? [United 757-200] This is only a partial report because you board a 757 (in this case, a -200 series) from the side,...
- Which seat works best with an in-cabin dog? [United A320] In case you need a reminder that different airlines configure a plane differently, here’s another A320 to tell you about....
- Which seat works best with an in-cabin dog? [Jet Blue A320] We returned to Seattle on a Jet Blue Airbus 320, so once again I crawled around under my row of...
- Which seat works best with an in-cabin dog? [Virgin America A320] We just returned from a trip to the Bay Area via Virgin America, so I had two chances to check...
- Which seat works best with an in-cabin dog? [JetBlue E-190] I started this series in December 2009, when I wrote a post about the space available under seats in Southwest’s...
I used to travel for business often and was a big fan of the aisle seat. If you bring a pet in a carrier on board, I can see why you would go for the middle or window seat. That said, I sometimes had a bag that stuck out a few inches from under the seat. Like the woman above with the Bichon Frise, I would open a newspaper or magazine across my lap to hide the protruding bag. One thing I had going for me … my bag never barked and gave me away!