On several occasions people here have started discussions about whether fountain pens can be taken on an airplane. Do they "explode," or is that an urban myth? or was that true at some point, but has been solved with modern engineering in newer pens? So I wanted to report a recent experience:

In the past few months I've been on several intercontinental flights, so I used this opportunity to experiment with bringing pens aboard the airplane. I started out with one, making sure to have lots of napkins in hand. Then after it functioned fine, I brought several more filled pens onto the next flight, and more to the one after that, etc.

So.. I am happy to report that the following pens had no adverse reaction to being taken, and used on the airplane what so ever:

Lamy Safaris/ Al Stars
Sailor Sapporo
Visconti Van Gogh
Montblanc Meisterstuck (Chopin)
Montblanc Greta Garbo
DaniTrio Raw Ebonite
Namiki Maki-e

One problem I did have, was that my Pilot Birdie (a skinny mini-pen that tucks into a Filofax), exploded in the German Ubahn. It had been with me on the airplane as well several days earlier. So possibly, it could have been a delayed air-travel-related problem rather than the subway's fault. Probably not, but i can't rule it out.

I can vouch for the MB Chopin 145. Perfectly airplane-safe fountain pen. No leaking or 'explosions', whatsoever.

... I should also have clarified that these were the only pens I did take with me, so I am not omitting the "bad list". The Pilot Birdie is the only question mark because of what happened to it several days later, so I can make no claims either for or against it. But *all* the other pens I took on board with me were just fine.

Most modern pens should behave quite well. Lever fillers will be fine, as there is no sealed section and pressure inside and outside is easily equalizes so long as the pen is nib up (any air pressure will leak out the feed, which will be nearly empty since the ink drains back). However, most pens nib down iare likely to drip ink, no matter what design, as the plane ascends -- there is no way to vent excess pressure as the ink "seals" the reservior as part of the mechanism for delivering consistent and proper flow to the nib as needed. Using a FP on a plane while climbing will usually result in occasional full drops of ink running off the nib.

Parker Aerometrics and pen with squeeze fillers and a long breather tube will likely only bubble air out the breather and write rather wet. Piston fillers, eyedropppers, and lever fill pens will likely blob rather badly, but only while climbing up to 7000 ft (all planes are currently pressurized to the equivalent of 7000 ft) -- after that, the pressure will stay the same or go up as the plane descends. You may be some dry writing intermitantly as the plane descends and the ink gets sucked back into the sac or reservior.

Again, nib up the worst that's gonna happen is some ink on the nib or in the cap. Nib down or pen horizontal, all bets are off.

I've carried Parker "51"s and Sheaffer Snorks on planes, but have not used them in flight. No problems at all.

Peter