How do airlines regulate the weight of the plane with passengers and luggage when they don’t know how much the people and luggage will weigh on any given flight?

Question

How do airlines regulate the weight of the plane with passengers and luggage when they don’t know how much the people and luggage will weigh on any given flight?

In: 2

Answer 1

They know the average adult weight. The baggage is weighted at the check in. Carry bags and duty free shopping are not weighed but are averaged in the passenger weight. Eg: passenger alone = 75kg. Economy Passenger (including carry bags) 85. Business/first passenger (including average bags) 95.

Then the entire plane weight is calculated with a good safety margin. A very generous one. If it is below the legal limit it can fly legally. (I call it legal to say it is by regulation, regulation means that is compliant with the aircraft weight and balance manual).

Then the plane can simply fly outside the legal safe threshold with an error of 20% at least, meaning it shouldn’t fly but if it does it wouldn’t crash.

Note: dumbed down a lot.