Hi, Recently I was on a domestic in the US flight and I asked for a glass of water. The flight attendant brought it to me and said, “The water looked dead, so I put in a cut lime to freshen it up.” I was wondering what would be the halacha? Would it be ok to drink the water? There’s nothing really treif that they would use the knife to cut up on a domestic flight.
Thank you very much.
Answer:
One can be lenient for the water.
I understand that no hot meals are served on domestic flights, and it is highly unlikely that one of the staff used the knife for hot food.
Unlike the knives of Chazal, we can moreover assume that the knife was clean.
Even if it was once used, we can assume the knife not to be a ben-yomo, so that the taste imparted to the knife is a weak taste that does not travel further (see here).
All in all, the lime should be taken out, and the water can be drunk without concern.
Best wishes.
Wouldn’t a lime be dovor chorif and therefore bring out the taam from within the knife, despite it being not ben yomo?
It is true that the lime can bring out the taste from the knife, but it cannot impart this taste on, because it is considered a “weak taste” (taam kalush). Please see the linked teshuvah in the response.
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