Try yawning, but don’t just do a fake yawn. Open your jaw as wide as you can, then move it side to side. This stretches the muscles around the Eustachian tube.
You have just been struck by the dreaded . ear plugged from flying
If you’ve ever stepped off a red-eye feeling like your head is stuffed with cotton balls, you know how annoying—and sometimes painful—this can be. But why does it happen, and more importantly, how do you make it stop? It isn't a cold (though that makes it worse). It's physics. Try yawning, but don’t just do a fake yawn
Pinch your nostrils shut. Keep your mouth closed. Then, gently try to breathe out through your nose. You should feel a soft "pop" as air is forced up the tube. Warning: Do this gently. If you blow too hard, you can rupture an eardrum. You have just been struck by the dreaded
You take a sip of your tiny can of soda, swallow, and instead of a normal gulp, you hear a loud . Suddenly, the world goes quiet. The person next to you is talking, but it sounds like they are speaking from the bottom of a well.
There is no sound quite as unsettling as the one you hear 30 minutes into a flight.
Ask the flight attendant for hot water with lemon or a hot tea. The steam rising into your face helps loosen the mucus in your nasal passages, and the act of swallowing helps the mechanics.