B757-200
Flight Attendant Current
Situational Awareness; Time Pressure; Training / Qualification; Troubleshooting
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Flight Deck / Cabin / Aircraft Event Other / Unknown
General None Reported / Taken
Aircraft; Procedure; Manuals
On final approach; it was discovered that the electrical power to the Business Class Lie-Flat Seats was inoperative; and they could not be returned to their upright position. This condition involved all 16 seats. We had 15 passengers. I felt it was justified to break sterile cockpit to advise the Captain of the situation. He 'cycled' the circuit; and told me that was all he could do; but it did not solve the problem. Two seats were in the full recline and lie-flat position; and the others were in various degrees of recline. The passengers landed in there respective non-upright positions. As mentioned; the cause of the situation was an electrical malfunction. I seemed to remember that there was a manual way to bring the seats upright; but I could not find the release pulls. The covers to them were not labeled; and I had never seen them in person. I had only heard about them when the seats were first installed. We were so close to landing (approximately 5 minutes) that I felt that I did not have the time to consult my In-Flight Manual. It would have taken too long to find the information; and I would not have had the time to address all the seats. I gave a couple of people suggestions on how to best position themselves for landing. Because of the close proximity to the ground; I did not consider relocating the passengers to open seats; which were available in the main cabin. I have since read the information in the manual; and I know now where the manual release pulls are. If I could do it over again; I would call the cockpit again and suggest that we abort landing to give us enough time to relocate the passengers. I believe the only time I was given any information about the manual operation of these seats was when they were first introduced. I believe their operation has not been reviewed in a training session. The First Officer showed me where a couple of the manual release pulls were after the passengers deplaned; but I could still not bring the seat completely upright because I didn't know that there were more pulls in different locations. Because I did not consult the manual; I did not know that it is best to have two flight attendants share the task. Since this was a full power outage to the system; the procedure of pressing the M button and the lowest footrest button did not apply. I believe that flight attendants should be made aware that serious issues with these seats can arise like this; and that they should have hands-on instruction and practice on how to reset them manually.
All Business Class lie-flat seats in a B757 failed electrically in the recline position during descent and because the Flight Attendant could not get the seats upright; passengers landed in the reclined position.