The safety risk of shrinking airline seats questioned by DOT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The shrinking space on airplanes is surely uncomfortable but it might also be dangerous for passengers' health and safety.

Planes are filled with more passengers than ever before, fliers are older and heavier and tall travelers no longer get exit row seats for free. All of this, flight attendants warn, is leading to an increased amount of air rage. Just last summer two passengers got into a mid-air fight over reclining a seat.

Increasingly, experts question if having rows of seats packed closer together might make it harder for passengers to evacuate after a crash.

As Americans prepare for another summer of travel, a consumer advisory group, set up by the Department of Transportation, dove into all those issues at a hearing today as part of its role to make nonbinding suggestions to government regulators.

Fliers last summer squeezed into the least amount of personal space in the history of flying. In July, U.S. airlines sold a record 87.8 percent of seats on domestic flights, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statics. And that figure doesn't include all the seats occupied by passengers who redeemed frequent flier miles or airline employees flying for free.