Taber the Airtoons Pilot: Saving Humans from Boring Airline Safety Cards Since 1999

Morning, humans.
Safety Cat has once again produced an amazingly humorous blog post for The OH&S Wire.
Here is an excerpt of Safety Cat's Pulitzer-worthy interview with Taber, the human behind Airtoons.com. Tune in on Thursday for the full version.

Q. When did you decide it was your humanly duty to add letters to these safety pictures?

I decided I had to do something about these safety pictures during my collegiate years back in good ole 1999. I believe I was a junior at Syracuse University and I had a safety card laying around my desk for a few months or so that I planned to eventually use for inspiration on my personal Web site.

After scanning it and looking through the panels, I discovered a couple of things each one had in common: 1) There were no captions on them, and 2) Some of them were drawn so weird. I mean like weird: A cowboy-looking dude in full-on chaps about to hop out into the water; this guy in a purple tuxedo with a top hat to complete the look, gracefully cantering for the exit; and this guy who seems to be eating licorice while floating around in the water. So between classes one day I threw a caption on Mr. Licorice and a few others and showed them to some of my friends. The taller friend said I should make a Web site for them. I agreed that I should dutifully inform others about the "true" meaning of the cards, came up with a name for them and made a quick-and-dirty site to house them.

Q. Why did you decide to do it?

Oh man, are you even listening to me Safety Cat? Put down your ball of yarn [but it's so bouncy!], I just answered that! My tall friend said I should make a Web site to house them, and I figured he was right. It would be fun to make a simple site and share the truth for all to see. Airtoons.com wasn't taken, so I quickly snatched that up.

Stay tuned for more Airline Safety Illustrations from Taber's site.

--S.C.