The shocking reality of flying Qantas in 2023: Photos shows plane 'falling apart'

A traveller's picture of a severely damaged seat armrest on a Qantas plane has shocked Australians - with one even calling it an 'electrical hazard.'

The woman, who travelled from Melbourne to Brisbane over the weekend, was surprised to discover her seat armrest falling apart, with the control unit hanging from the hinge, including exposed electrical wires.

Fierce backlash online prompted the traveller to shed more light on what happened. 

'This didn't actually impact me at all; I was merely surprised to see it in that condition,' she explained.

'The lady who was allocated the seat (another stranger) didn't seem too concerned.

'The flight attendant was shocked when she noticed it during the food service and said she would let the maintenance people know.'

She shared photos of the ordeal to social media, with many Aussies saying that it was a hazard and not a good look for the national airline, which recently lost its top spot as Australia's most trusted travel brand.

'Looks absolutely appalling and makes me a bit apprehensive,' one said.

'Absolute disgrace,' another said, while a third called it an 'electrical hazard.'

However others were more sympathetic to the airline. 

'Some clown would have to pull it with a lot of force to do that. No matter how well aircraft are maintained, you can’t account for idiots that do things like that,' one man said.

A second added: 'Things break and need maintenance. I don't see the big deal.'

Another added: 'So if this happened on the previous flight, and now needs fixing, would you have preferred they fix it and the flight be delayed a few hours? 

'I'd assume this would be logged into a list of jobs that need doing.

'Wouldn't it be better done overnight so as not to cause a delay and upset customers wanting to get to their destination?'

In a statement, Qantas said: 'Keeping the interiors up to scratch and making sure everything is working for our customers is a key focus for our engineering team.

'We've recently started a maintenance blitz on our cabin interiors which has seen a 20 per cent decrease in faults over the past few months.

 'We're also recruiting more engineers to support this important work.'