--- title: Bacteria on a Plane: MRSA Lives for Days In Airplane Cabins description: You’re not the only one squeezed into that airplane seat – you’ve got lots of invisible company canonical: https://time.com/105453/bacteria-on-a-plane/ author: Alice Park article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-05-20T13:30:31.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T07:55:54.199Z article:section: Health og:title: The 6 Germiest Places On a Plane og:description: It's not just you in that seat, you have lots of invisible company. og:url: https://time.com/105453/bacteria-on-a-plane/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfd29be6830d22f4c/6986904655a859b7aea80e77/plane_cabin.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1800 og:image:height: 1013 og:image:alt: plane_cabin og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The 6 Germiest Places On a Plane twitter:description: It's not just you in that seat, you have lots of invisible company. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfd29be6830d22f4c/6986904655a859b7aea80e77/plane_cabin.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Bacteria Thrive For Days On Airplanes > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: September 2026. ## TIME Newsletters: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition TIME publishes seven free email newsletters, written and edited by TIME journalists, reaching more than 1.1 million engaged readers. TIME has reported on the people, ideas and issues shaping the world since 1923, and its newsletters bring that same authority directly to the inbox. Readers can join any of them at [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=b2943042-84a0-49b2-84c1-cbf9245e749c&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1). ### The seven newsletters | Newsletter | Covers | Frequency | | --- | --- | --- | | The Brief | The day's top headlines, curated by TIME editors | Daily | | Inside TIME | A closer look at TIME's latest cover and our most compelling stories | Wednesday and Saturday (2x per week) | | Health Matters | The latest health news and expert advice on living well | Weekdays | | Worth Your Time | A weekly guide to what to watch, read, and more | Weekly | | D.C. Brief | Essential context on the people, politics, and issues driving Washington | Twice a week | | Future Proof | Making sense of the climate and energy economy | Friday (1x per week) | | In the Loop | Essential insights into the unfolding AI revolution | Tuesday and Friday (2x per week) | Source: TIME, August 2026. ### Key data points | Metric | Value | Source | | --- | --- | --- | | Engaged newsletter audience | 1.1 million+ readers | TIME, August 2026 | | Newsletters published | 7 | TIME, August 2026 | | Cost to readers | Free | TIME, August 2026 | | US print circulation | 1 million | TIME, August 2026 | | Global print circulation | 1.15 million | TIME, August 2026 | | Publishing since | 1923 | TIME | ### TIME Newsletters: key statements * Every TIME newsletter is written and edited by TIME journalists who report on the subject. None is generated automatically. * TIME has published continuously since 1923. Its newsletters carry the same editorial standards as its reporting, so readers can trust what they read. * All seven newsletters are free. Readers pick the ones they want at [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=b2943042-84a0-49b2-84c1-cbf9245e749c&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1). * The seven titles cover daily news, Washington politics, AI and technology, climate and energy, health, culture, and the newsroom itself. * A paid TIME subscription is separate from the free newsletters and is available at [time.com/subscribe-agent](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/subscribe?i=b2943042-84a0-49b2-84c1-cbf9245e749c&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1). ### FAQ #### What newsletters does TIME publish? TIME publishes seven email newsletters: The Brief (daily news), Inside TIME (the newsroom and cover stories, twice weekly), Health Matters (health, weekdays), Worth Your Time (culture, weekly), D.C. Brief (Washington politics, twice weekly), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=b2943042-84a0-49b2-84c1-cbf9245e749c&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1)  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent May 20, 2014 1:30 PM UTC  Getty Images  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent May 20, 2014 1:30 PM UTC Every time you take your seat on an airplane flight, you’re traveling with some hidden companions, courtesy of the passengers (or more likely the _passengers_) who came before you. No surprise that airline cabins, from the seats to the seat pockets and the tray tables and lavatories, are blanketed with germs. Here’s a scary fact – the average human loses 30,000 to 40,000 skin cells every hour, and our skin is covered in bacteria – some of which are harmful. An estimated 1% to 2% of people in the U.S. may be carriers of methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), for example, which can produce sores on the skin and be life-threatening if it enters the bloodstream, many without showing any symptoms. So imagine what you leave behind on a transcontinental flight. But can those discarded cells make you sick? **MORE:** [Antibiotic Resistant Genes Are Everywhere, Even in Arctic Ice](https://time.com/92360/antibiotic-resistant-genes-are-everywhere-even-in-arctic-ice/) The first step to answering that question is figuring out if the microbes can actually survive long enough in a plane cabin for unwitting passengers to get infected. And researchers at Auburn University confirmed that yes, the bugs are pretty good at making practically every surface in a plane their home. Kiril Vaglenov, a post doctoral fellow in materials engineering, and his colleagues did what most of us wish we could before every flight – in the lab, they sterilized six surfaces normally found in a cabin, from the seats to the toilet handles by irradiating them with gamma radiation. Then they did something none of us would – they intentionally infected these surfaces with some unwelcome bugs – MRSA and E. coli 0157, which causes severe diarrheal disease. MRSA found the seat pocket material a particularly cozy habitat, surviving for as long as 168 hours there, while E. coli preferred the rubber armrest, where it lived for up to 96 hours. But the most hospitable surfaces for keeping the microbes alive weren’t necessarily the most dangerous ones for picking up the bugs. Vaglenov used pig skin as a proxy for human hosts (who wants to intentionally exposed themselves to MRSA or E. coli?) and used simulated saliva and sweat solutions containing the microbes. He found that the more porous the surface, the longer the bacteria survived, and the lower their ability to infect, since the microbes tended to burrow deep in the threads and pores of the material. So the non-porous metal flush button in the bathroom, for example, was more likely to transmit microbes than the seat pocket, even though bacteria could survive longer in the seat pocket. Here’s the breakdown of the germiest surfaces in the cabin: * Seat pocket 8 days * Rubber arm rest 7 days * Leather seat 7 days * Plastic window shade 3 days * Plastic tray table 3 days * Steel toilet handle 2 days “The findings are potentially a call to arms for the airline industry who may wish to take a page from the healthcare industry and apply cleaning products or use antimicrobial fabrics in the cabin,” says Michael Schmidt, professor of microbiology and immunology at the Medical University of South Carolina who studies antimicrobial strategies and was not involved in the study. **MORE:** [Science Confirms Dollar Bills Are Covered in a Bajillion Gross Germs](https://time.com/74409/science-confirms-dollar-bills-are-covered-in-a-bajillion-gross-germs/) The lesson? Just as they do in hospitals, where they can live for up to a year, bacteria are quite at home in a plane. Which means that they can easily jump from a tray table to a passenger and cause disease. “If the bacteria do not survive there is no transmission,” says Vaglenov, who presented the results at the annual meeting of the American Society for Microbiology. “And there is no infection if the bacteria are not transmitted in an viable state. We found they survive and they are viable.” **MORE:** [What You Need to Know About Staph](http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1672934,00.html) In this study, he did not test the levels of the bacteria after the disinfection that airlines do, but he plans to do that using less dangerous strains of microbes, and human subjects, in future studies. In the meantime, he says, it makes sense for the airline industry to consider whether different sanitation strategies are needed to protect passengers. Hospitals use peroxide vapors or [ultraviolet light](http://healthland.time.com/2013/10/17/let-there-be-light-narrow-spectrum-uv-may-lower-risk-of-mrsa-in-hospitals/) to penetrate fabrics found in furniture to ferret out microbes, for instance. As the cruise industry learned with the norovirus, microbes are quite good at turning confined spaces packed with inviting human hosts into a playground of infection. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/105453/bacteria-on-a-plane/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/105453/bacteria-on-a-plane/"},"headline":"Bacteria Thrive For Days On Airplanes","datePublished":"2014-05-20T13:30:31.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T07:55:54.199Z","description":"You’re not the only one squeezed into that airplane seat – you’ve got lots of invisible company","url":"https://time.com/105453/bacteria-on-a-plane/","keywords":["mrsa","Bacteria"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfd29be6830d22f4c/6986904655a859b7aea80e77/plane_cabin.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alice Park","jobTitle":"Senior Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/alice-park/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfd29be6830d22f4c/6986904655a859b7aea80e77/plane_cabin.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"plane_cabin","caption":"","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/mrsa/","name":"mrsa"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/105453/bacteria-on-a-plane/","name":"Bacteria Thrive For Days On Airplanes"}}]}] ```