As America's college students prepare to travel to all corners of the world for spring break next week, they may have more to worry about than sightseeing and excessive partying. After a series of crises within the travel industry over the past few months, the prospect of traveling this spring break has become more nerve-wracking than ever for some.
In January, the U.S. Department of State released an informational advisory to students, which included safety tips and warned of common safety issues that come up as students travel, including accidental injury and legal problems.
"Although most students will have a safe and enjoyable adventure, for some the trip will become a nightmare with a serious impact on the rest of their lives," the advisory said.
Since then, the crash of a plane in Indonesia and a highly publicized customer service crisis at JetBlue Airlines, in which some passengers reported being stuck on planes for over 10 hours according to ABC News, have led to increased concerns.
According to Debbie Gibb, the director of marketing for the Student Youth Travel Association (SYTA), spring break safety is not a new issue.
"There's always that fear, especially if parents are letting their kids go away, that things can happen," she said. "But things can happen in your backyard, and I think people are aware of that."
Gibb said the SYTA, which is a travel industry trade association, works to add legitimacy to the travel industry by holding its members to strict safety and professional guidelines. According to her, one of the largest issues for students going on trips by themselves is legitimacy: often, in the search for the lowest price, they encounter businesses with unsafe practices - or just flat-out scams.
"College students, more and more they book online," Gibb said. "Before you book your trip, go to the Better Business Bureau, go to our site, go to other places and see - is this company listed?"
"From the beginning of your trip, be cautious about where you book through, know what you're paying for, and know what's included in the price you're paying," she added.
But Gibb said that no matter how careful students are, problems can spring up unexpectedly.
"No matter what precautions you take, anything can happen," she said, citing a recent charter bus accident in Atlanta in which six passengers died. "I'm sure the bus company has all kinds of safety things in place, but you unfortunately have occurrences."
According to David Johnson, CEO of the public relations agency Strategic Vision LLC, which specializes in crisis communication, travelers have become particularly skeptical of businesses in the airline industry. To Johnson, JetBlue's recent crisis has only decreased the public's level of trust in airlines.
"It's more of a black eye to the industry than to JetBlue specifically," he said. "It just reinforced the image that people already have of the airlines either not caring about customer service or being incompetent and not being able to respond to crises."
Johnson said that while he thinks people may be more wary of airlines, he doesn't expect that to keep students from flying JetBlue.
"JetBlue has been very college-friendly," he said. "They cater to a specific type of traveler. That type of traveler is going to keep using them for the same reasons they were using JetBlue before."
At Tufts, students said they weren't concerned about flying this spring break, on JetBlue or otherwise.
"I travel so often by plane that I'm not concerned," junior Meredith Posner said. "I love JetBlue - JetBlue is my favorite airline."
According to Posner, who will be traveling home to Orlando next week, many safety concerns are based on hype and inexperience, rather than actual danger.
"I fly every break - I've been doing this since Sept. 11 on and it's never been a problem," she said. "I think people who don't travel a lot create anxiety about traveling because they don't do it a lot ... When you take how many planes are flying every day, people would still prefer to go in a car even though driving is much more dangerous."
Junior Micela Leis, who is traveling to San Diego - her first trip without her parents - said she's not concerned either.
"I don't really get worried about stuff like that," she said.
Sophomore Ian Kershaw agreed. Kershaw, who will be traveling to Cancun, Mexico with his friends this spring break, said he's aware of recent travel safety issues, but doesn't expect he'll experience any problems.
"I'm not at all worried - knock on wood," Kershaw said, pointing out that the plane crash in Indonesia was on a less noteworthy airline. "These things are bound to happen, and it's just the way it is. If my plane goes down, that will be very unfortunate, but in the meantime, I'm going to live life."
If students do find themselves in a problematic situation, Gibb said the best thing is to have a back up plan.
"In the case of JetBlue, in that situation, I would just advise students to know what their refund policy is, and know, 'What if weather causes my flight to be delayed for a day or two - do I lose out on those days?'" she said.
Gibb said college students often don't think about these kinds of concerns in their enthusiasm for traveling and having new experiences.
"The younger generation, they kind of feel like they're more worldly, and they might take a little less caution because they're just so used to being able to go across the world on the Internet and e-mail and everything else," she said.
"I think they have an attitude - which is good - that they can do whatever they want ... that they have the ability to go out there and explore," she said. "And when they get out there they might not always be thinking about safety."
