Here’s Why You Should Never Order Coffee or Tea on a Plane - Flight Attendant Weighs In

There is a surreal feeling in experiencing the view from the window seat of an airplane. As the plane takes off, the window becomes a screen for dazzling cotton-candy clouds that plume in the sky with trimmings of golden-orange sunlight. This spectacular view often calls for a cup of hot coffee and a book of poetry in the hands. However, strangely enough, most flight attendants cringe at the thought of someone ordering tea or coffee on a flight. The reason is gross, they say. The flight attendants themselves, don’t like to taste even the hot water from the plane, as one told Business Insider.

“Flight attendants will not drink hot water on the plane,” one flight attendant told the media outlet. “They will not drink plain coffee, and they will not drink plain tea.” The reason is that water in the plane doesn’t come directly from the water treatment facility, but from a tank that is usually not cleaned for months and months. "Those water tanks [on the aircraft] are never cleaned and they are disgusting,” Kat Kamalani (@katkamalani), who has worked with one of the biggest airlines, said in a TikTok video. She added that coffee makers are “rarely cleaned unless they are broken” and coffee is actually made with the same water as in lavatories, something to make all the Javaphiles feel queasy with disgust.

“The fact the tanks rarely get cleaned where the water’s in should be the least of your concern,” Kevin (@ichbinvin), a cabin crew member, said in a TikTok video. He revealed that flight attendants are supposed to clean coffee pots not in a sink. Rather, they drain the coffee jugs down the toilets. “When you take a coffee pot and dump it in the toilet, in order to not make a huge mess everywhere, you kind of have to get a little close to the toilet. And I imagine that there’s some kind of backsplash of particles, bacteria, whatever that goes directly back into the coffee pot which gets put right back into the coffee maker,” he elaborated.

It isn’t just the element of disgust that’s the reason why people should avoid water-based beverages on flights. The reason is also rooted in science. In 2013, NBC5 reported that an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) survey indicated the drinking water in most commercial flights tested positive for bacteria. A 2004 investigation of over 300 planes revealed that the water in most planes contained a high percentage of “coliform,” a bacteria that is found in the feces of warm-blooded animals. Though coliform itself doesn’t make a person sick, it is a “red flag for other forms of bacteria which could.” Adding to it, the dirty hose and slime accumulating in the nozzles are reasons big enough for concern.

However, medical experts aren’t entirely against ordering beverages on flights. For instance, Dr. Cedric Spak, an infectious disease specialist at Baylor University Medical Center, told the media channel, that “he wouldn’t worry much about drinking airplane coffee, but he would not suggest someone with a compromised immune system drink a glass." Also, he pointed out that he would think twice before filling a baby bottle with water from an airplane tank.

Vance Hilderman, chief technical officer of Afuzion, also told USA Today, that “it’s 100% safe to drink tea, coffee and even water straight from the taps on modern airplanes in developed and well-regulated countries,” as most planes nowadays clean their tanks regularly. “There’s a chemical rinse they put in (the tanks). It’s not toxic. It’s not industrial hospital quality, but it’s actually quite good. It’s very doubtful that bacteria would survive. It’s equivalent to air filtering systems, HEPA systems on aircraft,” Hilderman said. In the end, no one knows whether or not the plane water is dodgy. So unless it’s a long-duration flight, it’s worth considering a little wait before you have that refreshing cup of coffee.

You can follow Kat Kamalani (@katkamalani) and Kevin (@ichbinvin) on TikTok for flight travel tips.