Jennifer White of Peta (Letters, 3 May) claims that it is cruel to transport animals in the cargo hold of aircraft. She fails to mention that not only are cargo holds heated and pressurised the same as the main cabin but also many thousands of animals are successfully transported in this manner every year.

Moreover, she gives no alternative to this. It is simply not practical for safety reasons to transport live animals in the passenger cabin. Of course, any death is regrettable and should be investigated to minimise the possibility of it happening again, but people die on flights too and I don’t see calls to ban them from travelling. Without a practical alternative to air travel pets would be forced into long overland journeys or unable to travel with their owners at all.

Des Senior

Exeter

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