I recently flew ANA and they advise all passengers to keep their seatbelts on at all times when seated. It seems like simple advice. I do the same thing when I'm driving. I don't find it uncomfortable in the slightest, even sleeping. Maybe others have a different experience, but turbulence isn't that rare. I've had serious turbulence on many flights. Probably the worst was final approach / landing in Frankfurt with perfectly blue skies. The atmosphere does weird things.

Every single airline says this for the last 15 years at least.

On some routes you see lots of loose seatbelts (Middle East, Africa). On European flights, everyone has the seatbelt on for the entire flight.

This behavior is reflected in car attitudes too. Many Japanese drive with a detached seatbelt. Not even the presence of children changes this calculus.

Wat? That seems out of character. Class related?

Actually that seems very Japanese in a weird way - they might be trusting themselves and everyone else to follow rules precisely, thus avoiding all the accidents and obviating the need for seatbelts.

Is driving actually kind of easy in Japan for this reason? I’ve never had a car while there. It’s wild how different Japan and China are despite being neighbors. I can’t think of a European neighbor pair that is so different.

One is an island nation that's been fairly open, the other had waves of isolationism, famines, and only recently opened up their markets in the late 80s. Private car ownership was not on the table until probably 25 years ago.

But to play your game, Switzerland and Italy, especially southern Italy, are very different.

Your counterexample is not even close to being accurate. Italy and Switzerland have much more in common than China and Japan. Italian is even one of the official languages of Switzerland. Switzerland and Italy are both essentially federations of distinct provinces. Both are recognizably Western European. China and Japan are worlds apart, as are China and India.

My main point was that there's plenty of reasons for China and Japan to be different, especially when it comes to driving norms. Are you surprised as the other poster was about these differences between China and Japan?

And going back to the original intent: would you say driving in Zurich and driving in Naples are two distinct experiences?

I can: Germany and (European) Russia. They are about the same distance as Tokyo to Shanghai. They have wildly different driving cultures! Also, China is the size of a continent. Did you drive in all the different regions? I doubt it. Do what region are you extrapolating from?

When I visited, Austria-Hungary were very different. So were Germany-Poland. And let's not even talk about Finland-Russia.

I mean, Europe had an iron curtain for decades and that shows at the boundaries.

Ahh.. a bit too trusting to the point of individual risk in a high trust society.

Most Dutch people don’t wear a helmet when riding a bicycle. As e-bikes are becoming more popular, some older people are opting to wear a helmet since the speed is higher, but many still don’t.

It’s not uncommon to see a parent riding around with a kid attached to the bike and neither are wearing a helmet.

I think it is kind of a cultural thing as well as convenience. If you ride a bike to the station to catch a train, then you might need storage or to carry it with you.

Pricesely this, yes. And for the kids, an average trip to school takes like 5-10 minutes, hassling with three helmets (mine and of two kids) takes almost as long. And then I have to carry three helmets if I want to drop by to the supermarket after getting them to school.

The bicycle seats for kids are designed in such a way that the only real danger of a head being hit is in the frontal collision, or in a really forceful side one. The design of Dutch streets makes the chance of either happening small enough that the helmets are widely seen as not worth it.

Why is this downvoted? Please explain. It seems like a reasonable comment to me.

I thought that Dutch parents put small kids on the front of their bicycle to absorb the blunt of impacts. Then you dispose of the small child and make another one.

Also it's just not really a big danger. There's no epidemic of brain injury due to this.

Part of the reason is that because bike usage is so common and the infrastructure is very separate (bike lanes everywhere, no mixed traffic on eg roundabouts), and bikes almost always have right of way and are not to blame in an accident, that drivers are very aware of them. I noticed in countries like Ireland with much less bikes that bike lanes sometimes just end in the middle of a high speed roundabout. And most drivers there have no clue which is in part because until 10 years ago you could just buy a driver's license at the post office. It was a "learner's permit" but it was normal practice to just go and drive.

So yeah in Ireland I wouldn't even ride a bike with a helmet. In Holland I'm much safer even without one.

I don't remember the "Not Just Bikes" YouTube video, but he specifically discusses the relatively low rates of bicycle helmet wearing, especially amoungst urban riders. I agree with you: When there are serious bike injuries, it is usually due to a car or truck in mixed space. When only bikes riding less than 25km/h, the injuries are pretty minor.

This really isn’t a similar comparison, Dutch infrastructure is built to prioritize making cycling safe at every decision point.

Whereas you’d be someone with a death wish to be riding without a helmet in most places in the US.

This is an asia thing, not a Japan thing. Saw this in most of South East Asia.

Loose seatbelts are probably fine. That’s what I do. Presumably that keeps me from getting launched into the ceiling. A lap belt is a compromise anyway. Aircraft crew use more as do car drivers for that matter.

Right but what's the point? If the belt is on very loose, you give your body a chance to gain momentum, which will be redirected when the seat belt catches you, which would lead to serious injury.

The belt doesn't need to be on tight, but it should be relatively snug.

It's just one of those things that is trivial to do, with a very, very low probability to save you from injury, but costs nothing, so why not...

You're going to the very extreme end of what he meant by "loose"...

I'm going by the levels of "loose" I regularly see on flights. I regularly see seat belts buckled, effectively fully slacked. It's not everyone, but probably 5%.

I'd rather redirect my momentum into soft webbing spread across my lap, than into my head impacting an overhead bin.

You won't gain additional momentum from a loose belt. But a loose belt may give your body the chance to slip out. The impulse you feel from a tight belt will be no less than the impulse you feel from a loose one.

>The impulse you feel from a tight belt will be no less than the impulse you feel from a loose one.

I don't see any interpretation of that that makes it true.

Impulse is constant, its the force that is transferred to your body. This is constant whether or not a belt is worn.

A belt simply takes that force and redistributes it into the seat frame, if the belt is not worn the force is not redistributed by the belt but rather by your head into the overhead bin

It's like debt. If I'm standing on the ground, I'm constantly "making payments" to the ground. If I jump off a cliff, then while I am falling, I stop making payments, so when I next contact the ground, accumulated debt suddenly must be paid.

More precisely, while I am falling, my velocity and consequently my momentum relative to the Earth steadily increases, which is analogous to debt because I will eventually need to restore the situation in which my momentum relative to the Earth is zero (because that is how people live their lives: at rest relative to the surface of the Earth rather than for example in orbit).

In the same way, the passenger in the airplane must eventually go back to being at rest relative to the airplane, but if the seat belt is very loose, "debt" (momentum relative to the airliner) can be accumulated before all the slack has been taken out of the seat belt.

Yes, the total amount of impulse (change in momentum caused by the environment's pushing on the person) integrated over time is the same regardless of how tight the seat belt is, but it matters whether that impulse is spread out over time or comes in one big jolt.

That doesn't make sense. Force is not accumulated by people standing on the ground, so your later analogy does not work at all

The ground opposes the force produced by gravity, there is no accumulation of anything. Gravity accelerates mass when it is pulling it in motion unless there is an equal and opposite force which is the normal force exerted by the ground (or airplane)

The impact is a matter of energy, not of force- if the force applies for more than an instant, you keep accelerating before hitting the ceiling and the energy of the impact will be proportional to the square of your speed. If the belt is tight, you stop at a lower speed (relative to the aircraft) and the energy of the impact (with the belt, in this case) is lower.

I disagree, a tight belt will cause the least amount of injury. Look at fall arrest systems.

If you're harness is loose, or your line is slack without an energy absorber, it'll break your back when you fall!

I've never been on any airplane where they didn't say you have to keep your seatbelt fastened at all times when seated.

I've been flying for a long time. It's only in the last decade that I've noticed the specific language of "keep your seatbelt fastened even if the light turns off". It's always been a "soft" suggestion, but it's becoming stronger, and repeated. The ANA flight crew in particular were quite adamant about it.

This may just be me becoming more aware of it, but, if so, I'm also becoming more aware of more passengers actually heeding the advice. I remember, not that long ago, most people removing their seatbelts as soon as the light went out. Not so common now.

> It's only in the last decade that I've noticed the specific language of "keep your seatbelt fastened even if the light turns off".

It makes you wonder why they ever even turn off the seatbelt light. Just keep it on the whole time, just like the equally anachronistic no-smoking light.

I feel like the light is just there to mollify the older generations who didn't grow up with mandatory seat belts wearing in cars, fought those laws loudly, and are still bitter that the government makes them take a sensible safety precaution. Are there enough of those people still flying that it makes sense to keep that light in use?

The seatbelt light nowadays is mostly a don’t move around sign.

During take-off and landing, it is. At cruise altitude, it really does mean "the pilots are expecting turbulence and suggest you stay seated", at least in my experience.

Of course they don't always get it right both ways: Sometimes reports of turbulence ahead turn out to be false positives, and at other times, strong turbulence can happen without any warning.

I've been on smoothe flights where the sign was kept on practically the whole time. Unfortunately I suspect some pilots forget about it, and I have observed that the public have gotten used to getting up to use the bathroom even when the sign is on (excluding takeoff and landing). I haven't flown enough to notice a pattern with specific routes or airlines.

There are times when the pilots are expecting turbulence, when they are notified by ATC or other planes ahead of them. During that time, the light means passengers shouldn't use the lavatories.

>Are there enough of those people still flying that it makes sense to keep that light in use?

There are entire states in the US that take that approach. Live free or die and all that.

So free.

>There are entire states in the US that take that approach.

Which ones? Rust belt? Flyover zone (or some such term)?

A "stay in your seat" light would be an improvement.

That's a good point! They even have a design for that on the bathrooms already (and now I wonder if that's always been the case, or if there was a time when people were frantically searching for the seatbelts there when the chime came on :)

> It makes you wonder why they ever even turn off the seatbelt light.

To tell you when it's relatively safe/not so safe to use the bathroom.

I've just browsed some old safety videos on YouTube, and in the U.S. this recommendation seems to have appeared in the early 90s (e.g. Northwest 1993 https://youtu.be/rUQtG0a_7d0?t=127), while being absent in the late 80s (e.g. Pan Am 1988 https://youtu.be/m3zj-oUm7vc?t=33).

Yep. Always have my seatbelt on. I am used to it.

I find sleeping on a plane more comfortable with a seat belt on actually. I hook my thumbs into it and it gives me more support for my hands and arms.

Might not be great for my thumbs in that kind of situation though...

I’ve flown internationally for a decade and it was only around 2018-20 I noticed most airlines reminding you to keep your seat belt fastened. Before that it seemed like the exception, not the rule.

Yup... I still don't understand why people decide to not put on their seatbelt while being seated. It's not like you have a lot more freedom of movement without the seatbelt? And it might just save your life in events like this one.

I've never seen turbulence like this. And until fairly recently I didn't know it was really possible.

So it's a bit like "why don't people wear a welding mask while cooking?" It was never even a risk that I had considered before.

> So it's a bit like "why don't people wear a welding mask while cooking?"

Your kitchen does not have staff telling you to make sure you are wearing a welding mask. It may also lack appropriate indicator lamps that tell you when it is a good time to wear your welding mask. It is also not standard practice in all kitchens.

It’s actually not like airplane seatbelts at all, where they are ubiquitous and the risks of not wearing them are fairly well-documented.

People are constantly bombarded with seemingly unnecessary warnings. I frequently assume that these warnings are to insulate a company from legal trouble and not really to protect me. This might be an American perspective.

See: many airlines that still warn to put your phones in airplane mode, despite that being known nonsense for decades

It may still be a good idea because of battery but basically no one cares. Contra early days of smartphones when there near altercations with passengers responding to one last email after the doors closed.

It's not "known nonsense", but not for the reason you think. There's a small risk of your phone connecting to some random carrier located in whatever country you're currently flying over. For some smaller / third-world countries, this can be quite expensive, cents-per-megabyte isn't unheard of.

Every time this is brought up people come out of the woodworks with post-hoc rationale for this rule that has no basis in historical fact. This comment is good example.

Why would the FAA and other aviation regulatory agencies care about your phone bill?

I completely agree on GPs statement being absurd post-hoc rationale, but interestingly, this rule is actually coming from the FCC, not the FAA [1], with the FAA only indicating support for it [2].

The motivation is supposedly cellphones at high altitudes interfering with far-away cell towers that are reusing the same frequency at a distance that would normally make interference very unlikely, given the radio horizon and everything.

I highly doubt that that would still be an issue modern networks couldn't handle (also given that most other countries don't have a corresponding law on their books, as far as I know), yet here we are.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/47/22.925

[2] https://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Advisory_Circular/...

It's not the reason the rule was implemented, it's not something the FAA cares about, but this doesn't change the fact that it's still a good idea in some cases, rule or no rule.

By that logic, many more things ought to be declared illegal by completely unrelated regulatory bodies. It would be a bit like the FDA banning gambling, or the SEC reinstating prohibition.

If that were the motivation, airlines should also display a "no credit cards" icon to protect you from overspending on the in-flight drinks service.

> cents-per-megabyte isn't unheard of.

If only! Double-digit dollars per 100 kilobyte aren't unheard of.

Here’s another American perspective: there are tons of videos of crazy turbulence tossing people around the cabin. I don’t want to get tossed around.

Warning fatigue is a real concern, and requiring people to watch videos on the internet should not be a prerequisite for adequate safety.

I've definitely noticed a proliferation of warning notices and signs in the US (and I don't just mean the Californian chemical hazard warnings in the most bizarre/unavoidable locations like a jet bridge), with the really important ones usually reiterated by a human standing next to them, continuously shouting the same instruction, apparently because people don't seem to take them seriously otherwise.

What is a "jet bridge"?

It's the enclosed, moveable walkway you go through between the airport gate and the plane.

It’s always been an American impulse to resist authority and think for yourself. That is generally admirable. Then at some point the “think for yourself” part got tossed out, and people disobey instructions for the sake of it.

It’s not that hard to follow instructions. There aren’t that many, and almost all flights have the exact same ones. If you don’t want to learn about getting tossed around like a rag doll at 40k feet that’s fine, just do what the crew tells you to do and you’ll be ok.

Something interesting I’ve seen on my recent domestic United flight, which I don’t think I’ve seen before. While the flight safety video was being played, a male flight attendant was walking through the cabin and actively telling people with headphones on (connected to their own device), to take them off and listen to the safety video. It wasn’t a recommendation though, he would wait until the person complied and would then continue down the aisle.

I didn’t have any headphones on. At first it felt a little bit overboard, but with events like this turbulence happening, I can see the need for it.

> Your kitchen does not have staff telling you to make sure you are wearing a welding mask.

The advice to wear your seat belt throughout the flight are hardly clear and emphatic. They often make it sound like something they have to say to cover their asses. There's certainly no clear comms around the risk of death and serious injury.

I have no idea in this case whether the indicators went on in time but I obviously wasn't arguing in favour of ignoring those.

> the risks of not wearing them are fairly well-documented.

Where? Where would I have seen this documentation? I'm 53 and I have no recollection of stumbling across it.

(also - please reconsider your tone next time. It feels like you're trying to get me riled up)

Yes, they say it to cover their asses -- for the very very rare occasion when an unbelted passenger ends up stuffed into the overhead lighting panel or carry-on baggage compartments. :)

Seat belts in cars also contain several CYA-grade chimes and buzzers. The owner manual may mention risk of injury or death. Likely an airline's contract of carriage contains the same. I suspect both are read as often and as eagerly by their users.

I think the multiple "off tone" messages you're getting are in response to your use of ignorance as a defense for ignoring airplane crew instructions.

> [..] in response to your use of ignorance as a defense for ignoring airplane crew instructions.

Unless I come from an alternate universe - most people wear their seatbelt during take-off and landing and when the seatbelt light comes on.

I wear mine through most of the flight but I only started doing this fairly recently because I learned more about turbulence.

I'm not defending ignorance at all. I'm simply describing how poorly the risks are communicated and the reality that most people I've observed don't wear seatbelts for the entire duration of a flight unless the warning light comes on.

Nearly every flight they state that you should keep your seatbelt buckled at all times. If someone decides that they don't need to do that, it is because of their willful ignorance, sorry.

If they spent the time to describe all of the rare-yet-possible ways a person could die on an airliner, the thing would never leave the gate.

At some level, take their mandated-by-regulations word for it? -- these regs are written in blood, and they say to buckle your belt, not only when the sign is lighted, but also any time when seated at your seat.

Boeing has done a good job of reminding us of some non-turbulence reasons to buckle up. You might also get sucked out of an unsecured exit door plug on a 737. :) I haven't heard that one mentioned in a safety brief yet.

In the pilot circles I frequent, the joke about seatbelts is that it helps accident investigators more easily count the deceased among the wreckage. So there's some YOLO fuel for your next trip. This was a freak occurrence. It's sad and it sucks. The injuries to passengers were likely preventable -- less so the cabin crew. New word is that the fatality was a cardiac event -- no belt buckle helps anyone there.

People who follow all safety instructions endure fewer light injuries, severe injuries and fatalities. Pilots who joke about seatbelts are just an example of professionals being hilariously wrong (or sardonic) about a topic adjacent to their expertise. Or they were just joking about their usefullness in an uncontrolled crash landing, which is extremely rare.

In this case, a seat belt would have likely saved the person - heavily injuring yourself is quite traumatic (tautologically) which increases the risk of cardiac events. In any case, injuries due to turbulence are extremely common as far as injuries in airliners go.

I think maybe you come from an alternate universe. It’s been standard procedure for at least 3 decades to wear your seatbelt, even if loosely, all the time you’re on a plane, apart from when going to the loo or otherwise moving around.

I mean, I don’t really know how to say it without sounding like a git. This is simply what you do. What “everyone” does, for a loose definition of everyone. The “everyone” that wears seatbelts in a car, for example.

Genuine question: you know you should wear seatbelts if traveling in the rear seats of a car as well, yes ?

As mentioned elsewhere I have generally worn a seatbelt on planes for several years. And I think other people should.

And I religiously wear one in a car - just like any sane person.

I'm really sorry not to be the strawman that people in this thread seem to be craving.

> The advice to wear your seat belt throughout the flight are hardly clear

> Where? Where would I have seen this documentation? I'm 53 and I have no recollection of stumbling across it.

Besides the bright "buckle your belt" sign in front of you and the little leaflet that says "buckle your belt" at arms reach ?

https://www.travelandleisure.com/thmb/K-qKcdwWTPYlcarQsYPkR3...

You mean the seatbelt light that is sometimes on but mostly off?

There's some weird disconnect in this thread. People seem to be completely misinterpreting me at every step.

I agree with this. The seatbelt light is as anachronistic as the no-smoking light. They should just keep it on at all times. People obviously are still incorrectly interpreting "seatbelt light off" as "I should take my seatbelt off now."

The seatbelt sign tells you whether or not you are allowed to get up and move around. Unlike the no-smoking light it has actual informational content.

And, frankly, the simple existence of turbulence?

It’s not like the pilots can see a giant messy region of air up ahead. Sometimes they’ll know the flight overall will be rough and can warn you but generally most times they tell you to fasten your seat belts some turbulence has already happened.

A plane the other day dove suddenly out of nowhere. Less recently a door plug blew off a plane and nobody was sucked out thanks to seatbelts. Before that, a flight departing Hawaii fell a few hundred feet without warning shortly after takeoff. These all happened very publicly and with widespread media coverage.

Frankly, if you fly a few times a year and never wear your belt you’ll probably be fine. But it takes zero effort and doesn’t need to be strapped particularly tight to be effective. There’s essentially zero reason not to wear it and it can save your life.

Sometimes you just have to use a little of your own intelligence.

> The advice to wear your seat belt throughout the flight are hardly clear and emphatic. They often make it sound like something they have to say to cover their asses. There's certainly no clear comms around the risk of death and serious injury.

I can't remember the last time I was on a plane where they didn't recommend keeping a seatbelt on at all times.

Here is the BA brief saying to do just that time 1:55: https://youtu.be/gBGbDQbwzWU?si=5KS4LTEcDmtQKJH_

Here is the United one where they mention it at 0:30: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2LSKVAH4WA

I can't imagine anything more clear than starting the seatbelt briefing: "It is important to have your safety belt on at all times"

They end it with: "In case of unexpected turbulence keep your seatbelt fastened, even when the seatbelt sign is off."

Its literally the first and last things that United tells you about your seatbelt.

A better analogy is probably having a fire extinguisher in the kitchen.

(Because instead of implying that the safety device is absurd, it implies that some people ignore the obvious)

Guessing you are on the younger side. People my age know to wear the seat belt due to watching coverage of aloha flight 243 in 1988.

No. I'm 53 and I didn't watch anything about that flight. I wasn't watching much TV at that stage of my life.

Do you fly over the tropics? To me it's not so uncommon to experience heavier turbulence when crossing the equator to the tropic of Capricorn, haven't experienced turbulence bad enough to see people pushed straight through the cover of the oxygen masks but I've been in a couple of flights where I experienced big drops in a split second, thankfully never seen anyone badly injured just some poor soggy bastard that was thrown around in the bathroom and people hitting their heads on the overhead bins.

I just always wear my seatbelt per the flight attendants' instructions, "keep your seatbelts fastened while seated" is a recommendation in every flight I've ever taken in my life.

i do in fact wear safety glasses when frying stuff and oil is splattering but you're right that most don't

If you read what I said it was nothing about "not following rules" - what rules did you mean?

And thanks for insulting me when it seems to be an issue with your reading comprehension.

Umm, I also found it to be a remarkably bad analogy.

More accurate would be something like:

"The chef instructor telks us every time we cook this flaming oil dish that can flame over unpredictably at any time so we should wear the welding helmet whenever possible. And I didn't bother and found it surprising."

Seriously, they tell us EVERY TIME ti wear seat belts at all times when seated. They don't do it just to annoy, confuse, or mislead the passengers. The only surprising thing to me is that such deaths are not more frequent. Despite efforts to predict turbulence, the forces at play when flying 600mph are insane in relation to the human body.

We need to respect that, because physics really DGAF about our opinions.

Pro tip: air travel “rules” are written in blood. There’s (usually) a reason rules exist.

It’s more like keeping a fire extinguisher in your kitchen. Some people may never need it, but grease fires happen often enough to plan for it.

A fire blanket may be easier for the kitchen

When you're cooking, you're not thousands of feet in the air in tight quarters traveling hundreds of miles per hour through the atmosphere in a however many ton vessel filled with flammable fuel.

Same in buses, every now and then you have deadly accidents, most deaths are due to people not using the belts and getting slammed around. It's one of the most easily avoidable death

Look at that one for example, the few people who had belt will most likely be fine, on the other hand people without belts got thrown around like ragdolls and many died: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldfgEJpIgKM&rco=1

Lots of buses don't have belts for passengers. I don't recall ever seeing a school bus with belts for the kids, nor belts on rny city bus.

In East Asia bus systems are much better than they are in most other countries. Buses travel everywhere and if they enter highways they usually have seatbelts. But people still just avoid them because there are a lot of "don't follow safety" social hivemind ideas.

What's not to understand about this? Airplanes are just super f'in safe and most people just think that nothing will ever happen to them, because rarely anything happens. Things do happen, but walking around the plane is cooler

People aren't killed on airline flight very often. Usually no more than once.

> Usually

If you have any stories about people that died on an airplane more than once, do tell :)

I think that was humour, but I could see someone having multiple heart attacks perhaps- and being technically dead, coming back with … encouragement given by CPR, and then sadly dying from a second heart attack/stroke/stoved-in-ribs…

Well, in the end darwinism still works, even tho we try very hard to fight against it.

Don’t tell me what to do!

I think it's something to do with being rebellious. Of course at work they do what they're told while building wealth for someone else. But something that really only benefits them... Nah. I've run into a lot of people like this, sadly.

It's also so if a window fails you don't get sucked all the way out (although you can still be killed if you're sucked partially out, as happened on a Southwest Airlines flight to an unfortunate passenger.)

I think more people would belt up if they have animations of people cracking necks or getting sucked out of window in the preflight video.

Probably would result in less people flying, more people driving, resulting in more deaths overall.

So, combine it with pictures of what happens when you don't wear a seatbelt in a car.

But this does not happen to you because you are an exceptionally good driver.

I don't understand this weird line of thinking. Don't do positive X because some people might respond to it in a weird way and do neutral Y.

Cattling statistics like this is silly.

If you showed fat people images of obesity and said that they'd be healthier if they lost their weight, you would also cattle the statistics and look at how many fat people decided to suicide versus how many took the advice (or didn't)? What a dumb way to construct advice.

I mean if it caused a spike of suicides, I’d find a new message.

Yeah and that's incredibly dumb.

That might make the pax more nervous and unlikely to fly more.

and the belt can be loosen up so you will not notice it that is there.

I always find it amusing that the moment the seat-belts light goes off everyone unbuckles across the plane

I think it should be required industry-wide. If you are seated, seatbelts must be worn and no loitering standing up. It is the case in most countries seatbelts must be worn while terrestrial vehicles are in motion.

I recall a very specific emirates turbulence experience which was hours of relatively mild medium bumps over Iran. The bumps weren’t as notable as much as the duration was. Seatbelts always for me too!

thanks for changing my life!