Don't believe that viral tweet about the backless seats on the EasyJet flight

All is not what it seems.
 By 
Rachel Thompson
 on 

Buckle up, folks, you're in for a wild ride.

A tweet claiming that EasyJet had introduced "backless seats" in its flights went viral on Tuesday, garnering 3.9K retweets and 5K likes and propelling the airline's name to the top of Twitter trending.

So, has EasyJet really allowed backless seats on its flight? According to their spokesperson, the answer to that question is a categorical no.

"How can this be allowed," asked original poster, Matthew Harris, who is, per his Twitter bio, the president and CEO of smart trade show event company Konduko.

Scroll through the replies to the original tweet and you'll spot a flurry of replies from EasyJet — the first of which asks Harris to remove the photograph in the tweet. You'll also spot an onslaught of comments from members of the public who were quick to criticise EasyJet for this, before the tide of criticism shifted as the story developed.

Harris refused to delete the photo and then tweeted a photo of the flightpath, stating: "This is a real photo of a plane currently descending to Geneva."

EasyJet told Mashable that the woman pictured in Harris' first photo was not permitted to sit in the "backless" seat, which was actually just a broken seat awaiting repair.

"No passengers were permitted to sit in these seats as they were inoperative awaiting repair," reads the statement.

"Safety is our highest priority and easyJet operates its fleet of aircraft in strict compliance with all safety guidelines."

Harris posted a follow-up tweet, stating that his partner took the photo. "One has to wonder how safe the rest of the plane was," he wrote. He added that the woman moved to a spare seat once everyone had boarded the plane.

Harris did not respond immediately respond to Mashable's request for comment.

Rachel Thompson, sits wearing a dress with yellow florals and black background.
Rachel Thompson
Features Editor

Rachel Thompson is the Features Editor at Mashable. Rachel's second non-fiction book The Love Fix: Reclaiming Intimacy in a Disconnected World is out now, published by Penguin Random House in Jan. 2025. The Love Fix explores why dating feels so hard right now, why we experience difficult emotions in the realm of love, and how we can change our dating culture for the better.

A leading sex and dating writer in the UK, Rachel has written for GQ, The Guardian, The Sunday Times Style, The Telegraph, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Stylist, ELLE, The i Paper, Refinery29, and many more.

Rachel's first book Rough: How Violence Has Found Its Way Into the Bedroom And What We Can Do About It, a non-fiction investigation into sexual violence was published by Penguin Random House in 2021.

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