Britain's CAA Considers Laptop Ban on Commercial Aircraft

hayb writes "An article in Britain's The Register claims that NASA and United Airlines have conducted tests on various aircraft and have found that ultra-wideband (UWB) devices "knocked out" collision-avoidance systems and impaired instrument landing systems. It states that the blanket ban on all devices in necessary because flight crews do not have the knowledge to differentiate between standard notebooks and ones with UWB devices."

Comments

But...

[Anonymous Coward]

...if there's a blanket ban on laptops, how else are you supposed to keep warm?

heh, way to go

[StandardDeviant]

Just today I noticed an article somewhere that was talking about the airlines hurting becuase business travel has gone down a good bit since Sept. 11 last year. (Business travelers are apparently the highest margin passenger class becuase they tend to book nicer seats and fly on shorter notices so they're higher up the essentially exponentail cost function correlating time-to-flight-from-ticket-booking and ticket price.) And now they want to eliminate laptop usage... Sure, I bet the suits and shiny shoes crowd will just looooove that.

Not that I care though. If it's good for safety it's beyond question. And honestly, if you don't have your work done by the time you catch the plane to your distant meeting, the chances of you being ready are slim-to-none anyway. Hopefully this might be another wedge in the organizational door being held shut against the wide adoption of telecommuting.

Re:heh, way to go

[pacc]

These are exactly the people that are guaranteed to get a device with WiFi built in because the higher prices includes some "extras" they haven't really had time to explore.

Re:heh, way to go

[mikeplokta]

Not that I care though. If it's good for safety it's beyond question.

It's certainly not beyond question just because it's good for safety. Safety at any price is a bad idea. If it costs $1 billion per life saved, you can save a lot more lives by spending the same money on preventive health care.

Re:heh, way to go

[StandardDeviant]

You're correct. I meant operating safety, namely the normal and reasonable amount of safety one would assume required in the course of the given action. (In other words, the safety one would take for granted when you're traveling hundreds of miles an hour, miles above the Earth's surface, in a hollow aluminum can filled with pressurized oxygen and awash in jet fuel.)

Re:heh, way to go

[sql*kitten]

(Business travelers are apparently the highest margin passenger class becuase they tend to book nicer seats and fly on shorter notices so they're higher up the essentially exponentail cost function correlating time-to-flight-from-ticket-booking and ticket price.)

The reason business travellers are willing to pay for better seats is that they have the room to work on board the plane! There are other advantages too (fully flexible ticket, greater cabin allowance so you don't have to check luggage and can avoid reclaim queues, etc) but really, what matters is being able to work on board. You can get an awful lot done with no distractions between London and San Francisco, especially if you can time the flight to coincide with a working day - that's one of the reasons that companies foot the bill for business class. Work that you can do on board these days pretty much demands a computer. Ban laptops and two things will happen: business people who really need to be there will be sent coach, and everyone else will invest in videoconferencing.

The one airline that's smart enough to train its cabin crew in what is acceptable or not is going to own the market.

Not that I care though. If it's good for safety it's beyond question.

What's "good for safety" is the plane never taking off. There is always a compromise between expediency and safety.

And honestly, if you don't have your work done by the time you catch the plane to your distant meeting, the chances of you being ready are slim-to-none anyway

That's not true either. Ever done business travel? It's common to get a template done at the office, get the very latest figures as assumptions that morning, and work them into your document on the plane. If it's just a transatlantic flight, you'll probably have to deliver that document or presentation as soon as you can get to the client's office from the airport.

Re:heh, way to go

[StandardDeviant]

When I was still in college a professor once said to us (a CS course, not that it matters): "If your project isn't done by midnight the day it's due, you're not going to get it done." The meaning being, if you don't have everything done by then the intervening eight or so hours will make little difference. The message is: have everything done at least a day before you need to, that way your preparation immeadiately before the event will just be relaxing. I've tried to follow this philosophy, and I've noticed that by and large it works pretty well.

To draw a specific example, "the very latest figures" are probably either hastily done or haven't been error checked or both. Or, worse, VLF(0) has a bug, bug is discovered after you are in flight (semi-inaccessible), so you go into the meeting with a fistful of VLF(0) rather than what you really need: VLF(1).

Yes, I've done business travel. Of course, that assumes you count my ssh packets going from Sendai, Japan to Houston, TX, USA as "travel". I really just don't think that a plane is a good working environment or that wise people would do vital work on the way to an engagement... seems too much like studying for the final as you walk to the exam. Save your company money, fly coach, and do your work in advance.

Re:heh, way to go

[gorilla]

Save your company money, fly coach, and do your work in advance.

That works for the occasional traveller, but there are lots of people who spent a significant fraction of their time travelling. If you're travelling twice a week, then 12 hours of imperfect productivity is better than 0 productivity.

Re:heh, way to go

[sql*kitten]

"If your project isn't done by midnight the day it's due, you're not going to get it done." The meaning being, if you don't have everything done by then the intervening eight or so hours will make little difference

You're assuming that the opportunity to work on the plane hasn't been factored into the plan. In general, it has.

To draw a specific example, "the very latest figures" are probably either hastily done or haven't been error checked or both.

An example of last-minute figures might be a company's quarterly statement filed with the SEC. The client needs the analysis as quickly as possible in order to make a decision. Or maybe the figures are delayed until the last possible moment so they can be error checked more thoroughly. Maybe a competitor has just made an announcement and you need to arrive at head office the next day with a response. These are all very common scenarios.

What matters in business is not just accuracy, but speed. The best analysis in the world is useless if events overtake it.

Yes, I've done business travel. Of course, that assumes you count my ssh packets

So you haven't, then.

I really just don't think that a plane is a good working environment or that wise people would do vital work on the way to an engagement... seems too much like studying for the final as you walk to the exam.

It's not the same thing at all. The material to be examined is known well in advance (it might not even have changed for years). The material you work on onboard a plane often doesn't exist in a usable form beforehand.

Re:heh, way to go

[satch89450]

And honestly, if you don't have your work done by the time you catch the plane to your distant meeting, the chances of you being ready are slim-to-none anyway.

When I was "commuting" from Newark to SFO while working for InfoWorld, I would complete a column while in the air. (Toshiba T1100+ could run eight hours on a single charge -- amazing what a non-backlight display and no hard disk could buy you.) Climb on a plane with my research in hand (some printed, some electronic), get into Borland Sidekick, and have at it. At SFO, my editor would meet me at the gate, do a quick once-over while my bag was making it to the luggage carosel, then off to the office to uplink. Worked like a charm.

When I was involved with the Telecommunications Industries Association technical subcommittee TR-30.3, the morning before the meeting was, er, interesting, as the committee members would organize an early-morning "Kinko's Party" so that everyone could get their contributions, honed and polished on the plane, printed and copied. A lot of V.34, for example, was done on airplanes.

So, like most generalizations, yours isn't worth a damn. (With apologies to Oliver Wendell Holmes, and also to Mark Twain.)

Re:heh, way to go

[StandardDeviant]

You're assuming that the opportunity to work on the plane hasn't been factored into the plan. In general, it has.

So it's planned to have someone doing important work in a crummy environment right up to the wire? That seems to violate what an ex-Navy friend called the 7P Principle ("Proper Prior Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance"). Seriously, fly over a day or two early and work from your hotel room. Or better yet... (see next block).

An example of last-minute figures might be a company's quarterly statement filed with the SEC. The client needs the analysis as quickly as possible in order to make a decision. Or maybe the figures are delayed until the last possible moment so they can be error checked more thoroughly. Maybe a competitor has just made an announcement and you need to arrive at head office the next day with a response. These are all very common scenarios.

In the case of SEC filings, I'm assuming that your organization has business staff on both sides of the pond (becuase you probably wouldn't be worrying about American paper shuffling if your .co.uk was just .uk). Why not skip the plane trip altogether and work electronically? It'd be a much better (or at least, much cheaper) collaborative environment, and then a .usian minion can be dispatched with the final output to meet the filing deadline. Ditto for the competitor's announcement. Really, the deliverance of original documents in a time-sensitive manner is the only reason I can think of for travel, and sending a bigwig to do a courier's job speaks of poor delegation skills.

What matters in business is not just accuracy, but speed. The best analysis in the world is useless if events overtake it.

I'm well aware of that fact, which is one of the reasons why I think air travel for business purpases in an age of a globe spanning, nearly zero-lag telecommunications network is singularly paleolitihic thought. Last time I checked, electrons traveled faster than planes.

So you haven't, then. [business traveled]

Thus far I've structured my business transactions to never require the horrid stop-gap measure you seem to hold as the definition of "business travel". The way I see it, if I'm working on a project on the way to delivering it, somebody screwed up. It's a profligurately wasteful use of resources to ferry all 1.85 meters/100 kilos of me around when the important part of me (my mind, my thought) is cheaper and faster to transmit over an electronic medium. Are there times when, pardon the crude language, shit happens and as the one holding the bag you get to hop the plane? Yeah, sure. That doesn't mean it's a good idea or something you'd want to plan for.

It's not the same thing at all.

It was an allegorical statement. I see that you disagree with my premise, that's ok. You people also eat things called "spotted dick", so obviously we're going to diverge in spots... ;-) [sidenote for those unaware of it, spotted dick is a kind of pudding with raisins in it. pretty good actually, if you can ignore the name...]

The material you work on onboard a plane often doesn't exist in a usable form beforehand.

Where you see efficient working, I see incredibly poor planning. Again, I maintain that if you're patching things together on the way to a deliverable, odds are the final result is going to be crap, steaming and cubed on a silver platter.

Really, let's get to the heart of the matter, the core of my objection to "business travel." I see it as inefficient expenditure of resources. The central thought behind it seems to be that the person traveling is so important that only they can do something, and only in person. It seems to be a very "Theory X" management theory sort of conjecture, that if some random C-level employee isn't personally there to get his/her hands on something, it won't turn out right. More corporate warriorism, rather pointless self-importance displayed in the war-paint of "The company must spend Lots of Money to get me to the action, becuase only I can Save The Day!!! Bow before m3, for I am B1FF, the Super-CEO!!1!" More, to be blunt, bullshit the corporate suits and shiny shoes set thinks smells like roses.

At this point in time, I see no real technical barriers to telecommuting for white-collar jobs. It's all social. And I don't think that telecommuting will be common until today's teenagers and Gen-X-ers are grey haired executives becuase nobody older than them has grown up with near-infinite permiability of the infosphere they (we) have. They see loss of self, loss of importance, with the lack of need for any one person to be in a particular geophysical place at a particular time. I'll draw an analogy back to the world of physical travel: CEO A takes a private jet and a helicopter to arrive at an event. CEO B flies coach and takes a cab or rents a car. If they both arrive on time, who is the better CEO? I'd argue that CEO B is a better CEO becuase they have been better stewards of their stockholder's money by planning better to acheive the same result at lower cost. But people, sadly, rely on symbols for too much of their self-worth. This is why, I feel, most of the orignial responses to my post were very emotions-based (one fool going so far as to label it the stupidest thing they'd read on slashdot, an allegation with the punch of a feather coming from an Anonymous Coward).

But hey, if you're convinced business travel as you define it is a good thing, have at it and good luck. Maybe I'll feel the same way when I've established my globe-spanning liberal army of darkness (oops, did I say that out loud? lies, all of it, i'm as meek as a church mouse! 0:-]).

200 Killed by Tetris

[muzzmac]

More news at 5.

Re:200 Killed by Tetris

[kubrick]

"I'm seeing falling pieces of metal, not falling blocks."

Re:A solution?

[iangoldby]

It's not the planes that are broken. The concern is that UWB devices if improperly implemented could cause interference. From the article:

With appropriate technical standards, UWB devices can operate using spectrum occupied by existing radio services without causing interference - at least in theory.

The article also states that UWB devices are unlikely to appear in consumer devices much before 2004, giving plenty of time for appropriate standards to be set to avoid such problems. It's not a big deal.

Eeek

[LBU.Zorro]

Does anyone else think that it should therefore be possible to create a small handheld device that say looks like a walkman/personal stereo, but contains an UWB transmitter? Activate it in a heavily traveled airspace and create chaos at best...

Rather than just try and ban the devices shouldn't they be working on methods of blocking the signals? Or altering the collision avoidance systems to cope with the interferrance?? Doesn't this smack of really bad shortsightedness?? Even if UWB is several years away, spark-gap transmitters ought to be homebuildable and with far more power than the average UWB transmitter.

I might be giving away ideas here, but doubt that terrorists read /. and that they couldn't have thought of it themselves :) In fact why bother being on the plane, have it in the baggage hold on a timer... It's not explosives, its a harmless walkman...

Just a thought, these things crop up when people try one solution to a problem, but they are just trying to prevent it. And even though people say prevention is better than cure, cure is far more reliable.

Z.

P.S. Sorry to bring the 'terrorist' angle up again but this strikes me as a stupid thing to do, even if it never occurs. When you have people's lives at risk it ought to be cure, not a reliance on prevention.

Re:Eeek

[evilviper]

You have a good point there... From now on, explosives will be allowed on commerical jets. I mean, hey, we should 'solve' the problem of jets being susceptible to exploding, rather than just preventing it from being an issue.

That's not to say I wholly disagree with you, but somebody needs to post a dissenting viewpoint.

Re:Eeek

[IIRCAFAIKIANAL]

Have you ever been through customs? Last time I went (April) I had to bring my laptop and a projector. They put the projector through the xray and asked me to turn it on. They saw the LED light up, and that was it.

They have no fucking clue what the guts of the thing was supposed to look like - I could easily have made it a powerful transmitter and nobody would ever know.

Even funnier - I catch my second hop (flight within the US) and I see a guy with some kind of transmitter/receiver with suction cups to attach to the window. Needless to say, the stewardess noticed after awhile and asked him to turn it off. Course, by then we could have been all dead :)

It's getting to the point where no electronics will be allowed as carry-on...

Re:Eeek

[jmaslak]

It is perfectly legal to carry an air-band radio transmitter onto a plane. I've done it several times. It's not legal to use on the plane unless the Captain agrees (and he usually defers to the company's rules - that is, he says "no"). But it is a good point, since you could transmit over many navigational signals with one, including things like ILS (Instrument Landing System). In theory, loss of any of those systems (it would be very hard to give false readings, as you would have to not jam but maliciously interfeer with multiple systems - you could break it, not make it give false data) would only result in the pilots implementing their emergency procedures...

Of course anyone who has used a radio transmitter near a computer knows that it ain't good for the computer. A sufficiently powerful transmitter will cause computer problems. I have no idea how that would affect an aircraft fly-by-wire system, nor do I know what kind of transmitter would be needed to get through the shielding...

Re:Eeek

[JimPooley]

One might think that blocking the signals is a good idea, but consider that this would be a retrofit into existing aircraft. Such is always expensive, both in the cost of the retrofit itself and the downtime of the aircraft in question. It might not be reasonable even if one has the time and money, as the solution will likely add weight to the aircraft. This can matter greatly, even on a passenger jet.

Exactly. Even the paint on an airliner adds significantly to the weight, and the amount of fuel used. Recent tests proved that unpainted airliners had a significant fuel saving.

Re:Eeek

[bigpat]

Or how about having a device to track down the signal so they can just tell the person to turn off their device?

Re:Eeek

[crawling_chaos]

Even the paint on an airliner adds significantly to the weight Lest you think he's kidding, this is exactly why NASA no longer paints the Shuttle's external tank. Look for pictures of the early launches and you'll see a pretty white tank, not the rust-red version we've got now.

Re:Eeek

[Hallow]

Yeah, I used to live less than a 100 yards from the transmitter station for 4 local radio stations.

I had constant computer problems, constant power problems, and my x10 stuff and wireless phone jack for my satellite wouldn't work. I could actually hear the main station on my corded telephone, and my cordless had a very loud hum to it. My 802.11b was slow as heck too (although there could have been other reasons for that).

I moved to a new apt. complex when my lease was up, and I have no such problems at my new place.

I say, stay away from radio stations and high voltage power lines if you want good wireless stuff, and don't want your hardware all freakin' out.

Re:Eeek

[passion]

...and we'll be forced to watch the mind-meltingly-bad in-flight-movie drab.

We are the airline, we control your eyes, ears, mouth and even your ass.

Re:Eeek

[IIRCAFAIKIANAL]

Don't know, specifically. Stewardess asked him if it transmitted and received - he said yes - she said turn it off, put it away. :)

Re:Eeek

[Maran]

"We are the airline, we control your eyes, ears, mouth and even your ass."

Only if you want to use them. By far the best thing to do on a plane is fall asleep (screaming, tray-bashing, hyperactive kids allowing). This takes away airline control of most of your body, though they still try. Last time I flew, the flight attendants seemed most annoyed that I was sleeping through the freeze-dried, flash-heated stuff they call a meal (I know they were put out because I was faking it ^_^ ). I swear they were about to try and wake me up. It's not as if I might have been dead or something - that I was breathing was obvious.

Maran

Re:Eeek

[evilviper]

I swear they were about to try and wake me up. It's not as if I might have been dead or something - that I was breathing was obvious.

Hmm... Maybe they were going to wake you up because your snoring was echoing through the plane? Just a thought ;-).

Re:Eeek

[evilviper]

No, actually my opinion was just meant to get people thinking...

For one thing, who are you to even suggest that something CAN even be done that would prevent passenger devices from interfering with critical systems? Are you an engineer that works on such systems? I thought not.

If I wanted to, I could stick a broadcaster in my checked luggage that, at a certain time, will completely overwhelm just about any radio signals. That means I can block the pilots from communicating with air traffic control, block their transponder signals, even block GPS signals. There is really nothing that anyone can do to prevent that from being a possibility... Nothing, besides making sure the device isn't loaded on the plane in the first place.

If you've got some marvelous solution on how to block out arbitrary radio interference, patent the damn thing and make billions. I'm sure the airlines would be one of your first customers.

Re:Eeek

[Ioldanach]

If you've got some marvelous solution on how to block out arbitrary radio interference, patent the damn thing and make billions. I'm sure the airlines would be one of your first customers.

Umm... ok... enclose the cabin in a faraday cage. Signals won't go in or out. The aircraft is already a metal cylinder. Put wire mesh like that in a microwave window across the windows inside the acrylic and ground it to the plane, between the cockpit and cabin add a layer of metal foil to the door and bulkhead. Same at the back of the passenger cabin right behind the toilets. One more layer under the floor and you're good to go. Passengers can't hear radio signals from outside, and your radar and other equipment can't hear the signals generated inside the cabin.

Re:Eeek

[compwizrd]

Last I heard, GPS units aren't allowed on planes. At least one of my flights had GPS units under the list of banned items onboard.

Re:Eeek

[Frank T. Lofaro Jr.]

If you've got some marvelous solution on how to block out arbitrary radio interference, patent the damn thing and make billions. I'm sure the airlines would be one of your first customers.

CDMA/Spread Spectrum.

Re:Eeek

[evilviper]

enclose the cabin in a faraday cage.

The airplane is already a faraday cage. That's why people aren't killed by lightning whily flying.

Signals won't go in or out.

I'll take that bet!

Put wire mesh like that in a microwave window across the windows inside the acrylic and ground it to the plane,

You just hit upon the problem. A faraday cage just routes the signal around. When it comes to radio signals, it's just a big antenna. Of course, the way around that is to ground the cage. The problem is that the plane is about a mile about ground.

That's why any solution will be 'magic'. A signal has to go somewhere. The only possible way to block radio signals, would be to find a way to collect them and store them in a battery, or broadcast signals to cancel them out.

Would you like to try again?

Re:Eeek

[Ioldanach]

The airplane is already a faraday cage. That's why people aren't killed by lightning whily flying.

The airplane is a faraday cage at the frequencies lightning affects, not at microwave frequencies. The airplane faraday cage is very leaky at microwave frequencies. The equipment affected by the interference created by UWB is inside the same faraday cage that the UWB is in. Partition the faraday cage so the passengers are all in one cage and the aircraft's electrical equipment is in another and you should be ok.

You just hit upon the problem. A faraday cage just routes the signal around. When it comes to radio signals, it's just a big antenna. Of course, the way around that is to ground the cage. The problem is that the plane is about a mile about ground.

Ground is relative. You don't have to store the random frequencies, just disperse them. Drop the random frequencies into a dummy load (common radio apparatus, pretty much an antenna in a can, though it'll get warm) and again, you should be ok.

Britain

[nmg196]

I wish he could spell Britain properly... I don't go around writing Amerwika do I? Especially since it's the article title...

Incidentally,...

[forged]

This is why I believe CD-player equipments (w/ laser lenses) were banned in the first place... That was a while ago, though.

The real annoying part about laptops in airplanes is the limited battery life. Where are power outlets when one need them the most !

Re:Incidentally,...

[matthew.thompson]

Where are power outlets when one need them the most !

Premium Economy/World Traveller Plus and above. Or at least if your Fly Virgin/BA.

Ironically this move would hurt those users who are paying the most. And me when I get a seat with a non-functioning video screen.

Re:Incidentally,...

[sulli]

Some airlines (American, US Airways, some United business class seats) have power outlets. You need a car adapter. They work okay though my adapter overheated on AA last month - I think you need to pull the battery so the adapter doesn't try to charge your laptop.

Over-reacting, again

[Llywelyn]

"...because flight crews do not have the knowledge to differentiate between standard notebooks and ones with UWB devices."

Two Replies:
"Knowledge is Power"

"Never Underestimate the Power of Stupid People in Large Groups"

Seriously, did anyone else get the impression from this that we are going to be flying nude without carry-on bags of any sort in the near future?

Considering how rare (nonexistent in the consumer market, according tot he article) these things are presently, why is this considered a problem that deserves such reactionary treatment as banning *all* laptops and PDAs? (Nevermind that if we want to treat this as a security risk there go calculators, game boys, and anything else that could conceal one of these things).

More reactionary nonsense in the name of "security": I'm waiting for someone to attempt to hijack an airplane with their shoelaces (a garrote) and see how quickly it takes legislators to attempt to ban shoes.

Re:Over-reacting, again

[Kanon]

I vaguely remember in a Steven Seagal movie

That partial amnesia of yours is probably caused by the shock of watching Steven Seagal movies. Just thought you should know.

Re:Over-reacting, again

[mpe]

While these things are rare currently, as time goes on, UWB devices will only grow in #s. It does suck that this is the approach they're going with for now (I'm sure there has to be some sort of screening technology) but I do see their concerns.

The problem with UWB is that the interference is on the same frequencies as the wanted signals. The only way around this would be to up the power of the wanted signals. Which is in some cases impossible, e.g. GPS and in other cases rather dangerous, e.g. radar.

Re:Over-reacting, again

[geekoid]

So the pilots are suppose to memorize every device that have UWB and recognize them on site?

this is not about security, it is about being able to maintain a clean signal for the auto-pilot.

the only person over reacting is you.

Problems with this..

[guacamole]

Not allowing laptops to be carried aboard would be a very drastic measure. I protest. I certainly don't want to check in my laptop with the rest of my luggage because:
1) Laptops are expensive and can be stolen
2) Laptops are fragile. I have seen how airport workers handle the luggage. I shiver with the thought of them throwing my laptop bag around like a football ball.

I think, a good compromise would be to allow people to carry laptops aboard but disallow using them at all times. Of course, the airlines could make a case for banning the laptops aboard by saying that they could be used by the terrorists to "knock out" whatever UWB systems that are vulnerable to this..

Re:Problems with this..

[tomknight]

"ehm, there is very little difference between taking a laptop with you in the cabin and putting it in you're luggage. The only between the cabin and the luggage is a very thin floor."

...and the aount of care taken by the person putting it on thne plane?

(I won't start mention the pressure and temperature, as I don't think they're enough of a problem.)

Tom.

Re:Problems with this..

[mpe]

ehm, there is very little difference between taking a laptop with you in the cabin and putting it in you're luggage. The only between the cabin and the luggage is a very thin floor.

I suspect this is more a "will it come out the other end in one piece" type issue. Both rough handling of and theft from checked checked bagage are not unknown.

So in other words...

[seldolivaw]

If I want to cause panic on a commercial aircraft, I no longer need to bring a bomb?

"Stand back! I have a bluetooth device!"

Re:So in other words...

[Tablizer]

Or

"Stand back or I will rub my feet really fast on the carpet and then touch metal!"

"I am [scuff scuff] a member of [scuff scuff scuff] the Al Queda Islamic [scuff scuff scuff] Liberation [scuff] Army [scuff scuff]. I have shoes on and I [scuff scuff] know how to use them."

This is nothing

[Aceticon]

One of the airlines (in Europe) that i've flowned with (and which shall remain nameless) forbade the use of CD reading devices during any part of the flight. At first i tought it was just misinformation from the stewardess, but i checked the airline's magazine and there it was in the safety precautions section - no CD reading devices.

I really cannot see what's the problem with CD reading devices. Maybe there's some BOFH like explanation, say:
"Quantum coupled ressonance between the CD reading laser and the flight systems"

Re:This is nothing

[Detritus]

Just about every consumer electronics device with any sort of digital logic will radiate EM interference. One solution would be to design them with proper shielding and bypass capacitors on all connectors. That costs money, which the manufacturers will never spend unless they are forced to.

I don't know about you...

[EvilTwinSkippy]

But between the tiny seats in couch, short battery life, the 10 minutes we actually get to use them, and jealous stares by other folk, I have just about given up on using my laptop on flights.

If I plan on traveling in leasure, I have my wife drive or I'll take the train!

Re:I don't know about you...

[King_TJ]

Yeah - of course, everyone's results vary, but on every flight I've taken my laptop on, I ended up not using it at all.

I just carry it on so it's always in my possession. (Too easy for some baggage handler to make it become "lost luggage" and sell it on eBay that night....)

Most of my flights have been state to state flights inside the U.S. anyway, and you don't really get *that* much time to use the thing. (You have to keep all electronic devices off during takeoff and landing, so you can only count time actually at cruising altitude as valid time to use them.)

I guess it's enough time to write up a Word document or two, if you need to do so. In my case, I get more done in the airport while waiting for boarding.....

yes and no

[corian]

It states that the blanket ban on all devices in necessary because flight crews do not have the knowledge to differentiate between standard notebooks and ones with UWB devices.

That doesn't indicate that a blanket ban is "necessary". That implies just that a blanket ban is either easier or cheaper for the airline than actually training their flight crews how to differentiate.

Re:A solution?

[funky womble]

With appropriate technical standards, UWB devices can operate using spectrum occupied by existing radio services without causing interference - at least in theory.

That depends whether your definition of 'interference' is that it stops something from working, or whether it's that it interferes with it in some way (maybe by raising the noise floor enough that Tx power has to be increased to overcome it).

UWB at the moment seems like it may be more of a way of exploiting patents before they expire, than providing something which is really necessary. There's plenty of ways to fit more into existing spectrum by being smarter (e.g. moving some analogue broadcasts over to digital modulations, use of time-division between operators, and maybe computer-controlled dynamic spectrum allocation) before some technology which works by interfering with *everything* (just to a smaller degree) to squeeze more in is required.

Well that's my 0,02 anyway...(bah, *Britan*, indeed). And I wonder, does laptop use at airports get banned too? And who, carrying a laptop, would want to allow it as hold baggage (if they're allowed in the cabin, you *will* get some idiots try to use them...)

Exactly WHAT were they using?

[Raetsel]

Okay, let me get this straight...

1. FCC approves UWB devices for testing at power levels an order of magnitude less than is commonly believed to cause ANY interference,

   AND

2. UWB devices have been tested, and found to interfere with the #1 topic guaranteed to scare large populations?

What device did they test? Where'd they get these things? How can I know they didn't just hook up a 30KV spark-gap transmitter and go "See??? Interference!" (Booga booga booga!!)

Oh, great. "UWB will cause a 747 to crash into the White House, curdle your milk, kidnap your virgin daughter and sell her to the Hells Angels, molest your wife, and defraud every company you've ever invested in!"

Great, sure. The airline industry (like any industry) hates to spend money unless it's absolutely necessary. Look at the current state of US air traffic control. (Yike!) Heck, look up the state of aviation radios, even! There's a simple little thing called "heterodyne detection" that isn't present! (People have died as a result!) Yes, there are fancy computers, and GPS, and "glass cockpits" -- but there are some extremely basic technologies of aviation that haven't changed in 50 years simply because nobody has said "That's dangerous and idiotic, we've had better tech for a generation! Do it right!!!"

On second thought... this is probably a good thing. It'll return air travel to its' proper place -- an enforced, several-hour vacation! Relax, look out the window, marvel at the world you live in. No phones, no computers, but lots of distractions. God forbid, you might even talk to your neighbor. (I wonder how many people even remember how to work with a pen and a piece of paper..?)

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[DNS-and-BIND]

Actually, the fact that the U.S. ATC relies on "dated" technology may be the reason it's so successful. Can you imagine replacing a Vax or somesuch that's done its job faithfully for the last 20 years without a single reboot, with a modern Windows solution? I wince to think what happens the first time they get a system error, or someone mails klez to one of the ATC's, or worse.

Dude, you're getting a Dell!

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[wowbagger]

May I ask what you think you mean by "heterodyne detection"? Because all the aviation band radios I've ever designed test equipment for were superheterodyne receivers, just like any other modern radio.

The problem with UWB is that simple fact that it occupies the same spectrum as everything else, by design - as a result it acts to raise the noise floor of all signals.

This isn't a problem when you are dealing with a signal that is tens of decibels above the noise floor, but if you are dealing with a weak signal, like GPS, LORAN, or another aircraft's ATCRBS transponder where you only have a few dB headroom, you don't have any leeway for the noise floor to rise. It doesn't matter what supercalofragilistic sheilding you put on anything to keep unwanted frequencies out, because UWB occupies the wanted frequencies too!.

And as for the tech in aviation not changing - tell it to the trial lawyers who pounce on any excuse to sue aviation manufacturers. If anybody introduces something new, and the plane it is in crashes, then the manufacturer will be sued for putting in "New, Experimental, untested technology!" - even if the reason the plane crashed was that the pilot was drunk, stoned, and inexperenced. So neither the manufactures nor the FAA will approve any new tech without giving it a multi-decade probe.

Let me run the numbers for you on interference.

Assume you have a UWB device at 10 mW output. Assume the bandwidth is 3 GHz, centered at 2 GHz. Assume the spectral shaping is rectangular. Thus, the energy is evenly spread from .5 GHz to 3.5 GHz.

First observation: the signal overlaps the GPS frequency allocation.

OK, now what is the power density? 10 mW over 3 GHz is 3.3E-12 W/Hz.

Now, consider GPS. GPS signals are about 20.46MHz wide. That means our UWB signal will be producing 3.3E-12 W/Hz * 20.46 MHz = 6.8E-5 Watts of signal, or -11.6 dBm of signal. The signal you get from the birds is less than about -90 dBm. You UWB signal is over 80 dB HIGHER than the GPS signal. Even with the coding gain you get from the fact that GPS is spread-spectrum you are still 30 dB under the noise floor. That means you could reduce the UWB signal by 30 dB (1/1000 the power) and STILL swamp the GPS signal.

UWB isn't magic - it doesn't magically pull bandwidth from nowhere, and it WILL interfer with other signals. You want to park the signal in a band nobody else is using, like up in the THz band, great! But don't put it down with everybody else, because contrary to what its proponents say, it does not play well with others.

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[Raetsel]

I know exactly what I mean by "heterodyne detection." I refer to the capability of a circuit to detect when two transmitters attempt to operate on the same frequency simultaneously. The 1977 Tenerife airport crash of two 747s (KLM & Pan Am) is frequently used as an example of (1) a heterodyne happening (it was recorded on the cockpit tapes), and (2) the need for this feature so all parties are alerted to the event.

Geez, you couldn't even type "aviation radio heterodyne" into Google to see what I was talking about. Everything I've posted comes up on the first page!

• Advanced Aviation Technology Ltd. makes a device for this purpose, their sales pitch (section 3) describes the problem. (How nice of them.)

• Salon posted an article about the problem on March 28th. Same example -- Tenerife airport.

Over 500 people died in that fireball, and we still haven't standardized a solution. It's been twenty-five-and-a-half years! That's enough time to come up with a lawyer-resistant solution!

Not going to bother bashing lawyers here -- this is Slashdot, feelings on that subject are well known.

• 
  "Let me run the numbers for you on interference."

Um... no. Your numbers are way off the mark. Assumptions are dangerous, you have an internet connection, why didn't you use it? Google for "FCC UWB limits" -- the first link is a whole set of info on power levels and spectrum allocation. Digging a bit deeper, you'll find:

• "...For now, UWB communications devices will be restricted to intentional operation only between 3.1 and 10.6 GHz; through-wall imaging and surveillance systems restricted between 1.99 and 10.6 GHz (and used only for law enforcement, fire and rescue, and other designated organizations) and automotive radars restricted to frequencies above 24.075 GHz."

  Further, maximum output -- anywhere in the spectrum -- must be under limits set by part 15 (for now). That's -41.25 dBm/MHz.

Further, since you seem particularly worried about interference with GPS, I point you to this PowerPoint presentation from IEEE, or Google's rather poor HTML translation of the same thing. (It loses the graphics) The point? UWB is specifically regulated to stay out of the GPS bands.

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[rcw-home]

I know exactly what I mean by "heterodyne detection."

The reason other people don't is because the word heterodyne is more typically used to discuss combining two signals for some intended purpose - for example, the combining of a carrier signal and an audio frequency signal. So, it's correct to say that any AM signal is a "heterodyne happening." It's also correct to say that two overlapping AM signals are a "heterodyne happening." You can avoid vagueness by referring to the latter as "interference".

It's not human nature to attempt to disect an already familiar word's base meaning when the context seems wrong.

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[wowbagger]

First of all, "two transmitters on the same frequency" is exactly why aircraft radios still use AM - so that you can hear both signals, unlike FM where capture effect will only let you hear one signal. And to a radio engineer, "heterodyne detection" means "demodulating a signal via mixing of two different frequency signals".

And so what if you can detect a collision - that doesn't help you do diddly about it except try again. And if the interfering carrier is constantly present, you won't get through the second time, either.

The primary concern for aviation interference would be ATCRBS at 1.030 GHz and GPS at 1.5 and 1.7 GHz. That's why I discussed them.

At -41.25 dBm/MHz, you still have over -30 dBm interference in the GPS band, so merely appealing to part 15 won't work there. Additionally, the FCC does not regulate the world - what happens when somebody from Singapore boards an aircraft with a device that isn't following type 15 rules (as has happened in the past.)

Also, if you have multiple UWB devices on the aircraft, they can heterodyne through any corroded fitting, any non-linearity in any receiver to produce mixing products across the board. 2 devices could easily mix down into the 1.03 and 1.5 GHz bands. Get more than a few devices on the plane and you could very easily raise the noise floor on GPS to a level that introduces errors. And when you are on GPS controlled final approach as the aviation industry wants to do, an error of a few meters can spell the difference between "Please remains seated until the aircraft comes to a complete stop" and "Mobilize emergency units to 19L".

The whole point here is that the UWB snakeoil salesmen try to say "We won't interfere - we're MAGIC" and they are full of it. UWB is just another transmitter, and the aviation regulators are quite correct in being concerned about this.

I am working with the people DOING these tests - are you?

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[geekoid]

Sometime the ignorance on this board is so great, I swear I'll never comeback, then someone with a clue will post something that makes me remember not everybody is a clueless, knee-jerk, reactionary, moron.
thanks.

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[Raetsel]

You didn't read any of those links, did you?

(Don't bother to answer, it's obvious.)

1. From http://www.aatl.net/publications/contran.htm
   • "The mechanics of blocked transmissions are easily understood. In general, it may involve simultaneous transmission from two aircraft or simultaneous transmission from an aircraft and ATC. These transmissions interfere with each other, "blocking" both signals. There is a widespread belief that such blocked transmissions would always be detected (i.e heterodyne heard by the pilot and/or ATC). An equally widespread belief, held by controllers, is that ATC transmissions are always heard. Neither is necessarily true. However, even if detected, it is often too late to do anything and aircrew and ATC are usually too busy managing events in progress."

   The person who has the mic keyed isn't going to hear anything, and thus won't know their transmission wasn't received. The whole point is to notice that a communications breakdown happened and correct it before something bad happens.

2. I tried to make it clear that -41.25 was the very top end of allowed emissions for UWB. When GPS frequencies are at stake, the limits are much lower.

   Read the slides at http://www.sss-mag.com/uwbslides.html -- that's the "first link" I referred to before.

   When referring to GPS frequencies, the FCC limit for indoor & handheld outdoor UWB devices is -75 dBm/MHz. GPR, wall imaging, and medical imaging systems are limited to -65, and thru-wall imaging and surveilance systems can go all the way up to about -53 dBm/MHz -- but only law enforcement, fire, and rescue organizations get access to that equipment.

   The IEEE Powerpoint presentation has some interesting information on noise floors -- you might want to read that.

Claiming employment by a corporation in a particular field does not magically correct wrong information. It actually makes me wonder more why you're bothering to argue wrong information so strongly in the face of evidence to the contrary. Attention to detail (and bothering to look up those details!) would help you. I have tried to show you, but you have refused to look.

I must note one thing, though... you'd make an excellent scare-monger. You've got the Star Trek-style technobabble down pat. Have you considered a position as a lobbyist? How about running for congress?

This is the end of this thread from my end, I've made my point. All the info is there for those who care to read it.

Re:Exactly WHAT were they using?

[wowbagger]

Considering the trollish way you started this out, why should I be concerned about your links? Let us look at them: HMMM. Most of them seem to be coming from the very company that claims to have a solution. Wouldn't think they'd be biased, now would they?

Secondly, you didn't refute my point about signal mixing in the presence of multiple transmitters - two devices operating at 10GHz can be mixed down into the GPS band by a) their own front ends, b) a corroded fitting in the aircraft, c) the front end of the aircraft's radio, or d) any and all of the above. Having had to RDF signals being created by the mix products of multiple transmitters by old rusty fences, faulty equipment, and other nonlinear sources I know from personal experience that this can happen.

Furthurmore, my point was that the various air control agencies have good reason to be concerned, a point I think I made.

Lastly, the solution to doubling on the radio is not some magical box that will detect it (since it is very difficult to detect another transmitter at any distance from you when you are transmitting on that frequency yourself, it is what pilots and ATC personell are trained to to: acknowledge the transmission! That way, you not only deal with doubles, but misunderstandings too.

I am *discussing* this information because I've encountered far too many people like yourself who don't want to consider any viewpoint other than their own, and I've watch bad law and bad tech result from it. I am trying to be calm and reasonable. I leave it up to the reader to determine whether I have succeeded, and whether you have even tried.

However, if you wish to discontinue the discussion I have no problem with that. You've said what you want to say, and included your links. I've said what I want to say. Let the reader decide.

Standards

[nuggz]

Just make sure the UWB standards don't use any preallocated frequencies. And have hefty fines for making/possessing one that does.

Re:Standards

[nuggz]

So you'll just make a device that spews crap into allocated frequencies? Sounds like a friendly technology.

Re:Standards

[mpe]

UWB means Ultra Wide Band.
It sends data at very low power across a very wide range of frequencies, avoiding all of the used frequencies, or even just many of them would kind of defeat the objective.

One of the effects this has is to jam anything on the same waveband which does not use quite powerful signals. Really you should only use it where nothing else makes use of that band.

Laptop Power

[T-Kir]

Oh well, I just came off a transatlantic flight to London on the weekend and it looks like they give laptop power cords for anyone who needs them (even in economy - I may be wrong though)... so I guess they'd be plugging those up (so to speak), at least in British airspace.

Stability And Security

[Effugas]

Once again, the equivalence of instability with insecurity rears its ugly head.

What we appear to have is a claim that airplane electronics are extraordinarily open to interference from consumer devices. They are so open, that such devices may indeed accidentally trigger safety-critical failures in the operating environment.

Lets assume this is true.

Now understand, that which can be accidental does not need to be.

If one can accidentally down a plane with a gameboy, it stands to reason that one may be able to intentionally down the plane with the very same gameboy -- easier, in fact, because the attacker knows exactly which frequencies to exploit. This is...disturbing. I cannot imagine it very difficult to stow any form of consumer electronics, even with a "time delay" activation, inside of luggage or carryon.

Now, I'm not afraid of gameboys. See, I've *met* Boeing safety engineers. Hell, I've quoted em, learned a bit from em. Paranoid doesn't begin to describe them. These guys imagine everything, and implying that they didn't budget for even a miniscule amount of shielding and noise resistance...it's almost insulting.

Hell, you don't see planes crash every time the sun decides to belch out a few terajoules of flare in our direction. Not to mention the basic design of a fuselage bears some resemblance to an EM-blocking faraday cage.

Granted, it may very well be this same paranoia that allows those same engineers to say "Please, no new equipment, we couldn't test with that precise radio environment". The *world* is an unpredictable precise radio environment, and unfortunately, so now are its residents. I hate to say it, but if a plane can't survive a ringing cell phone, it ain't Nokia who's to blame.

That being said, the UWB failure are interesting: If the claim is that UWB operates below the noise floor relative to a given frequency, then the question becomes how did the collision avoidance systems even *detect* UWB transmissions, unless they themselves operate in a baseband manner?

One answer is that noise floors might be relative: A nearby transmitter emitting weakly across all frequencies might be overpowering the far away signal tranmitting on one. This is...hard to believe, but not impossible.

I suppose that's my biggest problem with the consumer electronics ban: Since it's inconceivable that planes are actually vulnerable to random noise from consumer electronics, *all* device-level concerns become suspect. That's annoying.

If somebody -- anybody -- has evidence they feel I should see, feel free to contact me here or in email.

Yours Truly,

Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com

Re:Stability And Security

[p3d0]

But this transmitter is inside a faraday cage...

Right, and the airplane's transmitters are outside the cage. (They must be, or they wouldn't work, right?) Thus, the plane's transmitters should theoretically be shielded from the passengers' interference.

I would be willing to bet a beer that if you placed the sun in the same position, the plane would crash.

I'll take that bet. I think the plane wouldn't survive long enough to crash.

Re:Stability And Security

[Shirotae]

Now understand, that which can be accidental does not need to be.

One factor that we must remember is that permission to use a device applies to all the passengers, but malicious intent is rare. It may well be the case that one or a few devices can be tolerated, but dozens or hundreds cause a problem. For example, the one cellphone activated by a terrorist may not do much harm, but when every passenger calls to say "we are just landing", that may be more of a problem.

One passenger using one device may not do much harm, just as killing one whale, using one CFC aerosol, cutting down one tree etc. does not do much harm. If we want to be sure that the devices are safe, we have to think in terms of every passenger being wired up like a christmas tree with every combination of devices. It may be beyond the average, but I would not want to be crew on a flight taking people to the UberGeek Convention if there is no restriction on passengers' use of electronic and radiating devices.

Re:Stability And Security

[KC7GR]

Dan Kaminsky writes...

Now, I'm not afraid of gameboys. See, I've *met* Boeing safety engineers. Hell, I've quoted em, learned a bit from em. Paranoid doesn't begin to describe them. These guys imagine everything, and implying that they didn't budget for even a miniscule amount of shielding and noise resistance...it's almost insulting.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

I can go you one better than that. I've SEEN the innards and design of lots of the "Black Boxes" that make up the core of modern avionics. I've also seen how the wiring harnesses are put together, and what's being used material-wise.

If this UWB test scrambled something in the CAS or ILS, then either the test itself was seriously flawed or the UWB unit was spewing spurious signals. The avionics "black boxes" themselves are heavily shielded, and the cabling going to the antennas is a type that has two layers of shield braid. Don't even get me started on the grounding systems.

Banning laptops entirely would be far too extreme a measure, one that (as others have pointed out) would tend to piss off an airline's most critical customers. Assuming this test was actually valid, I would say train the flight crews to check for UWB devices and be done with it. Radio transmitters (and some types of receivers) are already prohibited for inflight use. Let's leave it at that.

Re:Stability And Security

[geekoid]

actually, it is the phne companies to blame.

its not all cell phones the do this, on osme that are not designed properly.

as a matter of fact, if you use a cell phone and they notice it knock out a system, they may offer you money for your cell phone on the spot. I know boeing has done that from time to time.

they take it and test it to see if its there system or the phones system that has a poroblem.

if its the phone(never heard of a case where it wasn't) the FCC and the phone company get notified.

iis only one system there talking about, and the plane can be handled safely with out it.

WHen your dealing with a device or system, such as UWB, that will be put into many electronic, and considering the the prolifiration of electronic device, this is the only reasonable response. Unless you want to wait even longer as they check every device with electronic to ensure t complies?

And I mean every device, just because you nifty1000 laptop complies does not mean the next nifty1000 will.

Re:Stability And Security

[Skuld-Chan]

I can understand where they are coming from though. As a ham radio operator (mail me at skuld(at)mail.ru if you want to know my call sign) I've found that most consumer electronics exhibit some degree of rfi - computers more so then anything. I've worked very hard to try to make sure that my computer doesn't interfere with my hf transciever (since I like to use it for logging contacts), but once it a while it does. Certian screen modes my monitor puts out for instance make whirring noises on 80/75 meters completely knocking out reception across a lot of that particular band. Until I laced the thing with filters I could hear my hdd clicking away on various frequencies too.

I've noticed on my scope that even on relatively new vhf/uhf equipment a considerable amount of front end noise being picked up by my equipment from almost any computer.

And while driving around on my old Icom 3200 a/e - especially in near the mall I'll hear data bursts actually break squelch - I'm assuming some of these rf devices used in stores are several mhz over! My signal doesn't bleed that bad at 45-150 watts - why does theirs?

I can understand why an airplane operator - which has tons of rf devices in it (both narrow band and wide band spread spectrum) - used for everything from flight control, vhf/uhf radios for tower/local airplane communication to hf radios used for navigation with flight towers (tune across 60 meters sometime - you'll be suprised) would be concerned about consumer junk (yes you heard right) interfering with his/her equipment. Manufacturers of this stuff take no reguard to sensitive professional/amateur equipment when it comes to rfi.

Potential reactions...

[Raetsel]

I don't know if you'd even get to finish that sentence...

• "Stand back! I have a bluetooth..."

"Eewwww, get away! Heard of a toothbrush? When was the last time you used one??"

"Blue tooth, huh? You really ought to see a dentist about that..."

Another down side is that geeks talking about tech are going to be put in the same category as people making jokes about bombs, guns, and hijackings -- subject to summary arrest.

airline security is apparently still lacking

[g4dget]

If a laptop can play havoc with navigation and landing systems, there is something wrong with the navigation and landing systems. Banning laptops isn't going to fix this. Installing shielding or more robust airplane electronics are solutions.

Re:airline security is apparently still lacking

[Detritus]

There is nothing wrong with the navigation and landing systems. Aircraft electronics equipment (avonics) is designed and built to a much higher standard than most electronics equipment. The problem is basic physics. An unintentional emitter that is a stone's throw away from the navigation and communication antennas can easily jam a 500-watt ground based transmitter that is 50 miles away. Before the age of microprocessors, there were problems with the unintentional radiation from the local oscillators in passenger-carried FM broadcast receivers jamming the radio equipment on aircraft.

Re:airline security is apparently still lacking

[Cyberdyne]

If a laptop can play havoc with navigation and landing systems, there is something wrong with the navigation and landing systems. Banning laptops isn't going to fix this. Installing shielding or more robust airplane electronics are solutions.

Damn right!

A year or two ago, I went to a lecture from an expert in radio interference from DERA (UK Defence Evaluation and Research Agency - the guys who write the UK's rules on this stuff) and he showed us a graph of the requirements for noise immunity (as in, if your plane's electronics can't take this level of noise at this frequency, it's grounded). Then he showed us the maximumoutput of a cellphone. In short: find me a plane which is genuinely affected by use of a phone inside, and I'll show you a plane which won't be leaving the ground any time soon...

Not to mention, as others have pointed out, any aircraft system that vulnerable to interference is just begging to be knocked down by terrorists - forget planting a bomb, just get a little battery-powered RF transmitter on! A slightly modified electric shaver would probably do just fine...

There is a genuine reason not to use cellphones in aircraft, though: cellphone networks are carefully designed to avoid frequency conflicts between towers with the phone being at ground level. Put a phone at 30,000 feet, and it "sees" multiple cells on each frequency - which apparently can upset the phone network.

Of course, the airlines don't like you using phones (other than their $5/min "skyphones", of course) or anything else interactive, because it stops you buying expensive drinks (on domestic flights), duty free (on international flights) etc. How "convenient" that United just found a "safety" reason to stop you doing anything that doesn't involve paying them more money, huh?

Re:airline security is apparently still lacking

[mpe]

There is a genuine reason not to use cellphones in aircraft, though: cellphone networks are carefully designed to avoid frequency conflicts between towers with the phone being at ground level. Put a phone at 30,000 feet, and it "sees" multiple cells on each frequency - which apparently can upset the phone network.
Of course, the airlines don't like you using phones (other than their $5/min "skyphones", of course) or anything else interactive, because it stops you buying expensive drinks (on domestic flights), duty free (on international flights) etc. How "convenient" that United just found a "safety" reason to stop you doing anything that doesn't involve paying them more money, huh?

The thing is that if you can connect a "skyphone" to the telephone network you could just as easily install a pico cell in the aircraft and have any phones roam onto that. (with the handset on its lowest power setting.)
That way you can still charge whatever price you like for the calls, including incomming, but don't have to maintain what in some cases amounts to a large PBX.

Re:airline security is apparently still lacking

[mpe]

The problem is basic physics. An unintentional emitter that is a stone's throw away from the navigation and communication antennas can easily jam a 500-watt ground based transmitter that is 50 miles away.

Since radio follows an inverse square law you might have to knock the ground station up to several kW to get through the interference. In which case anything close to the transmitter now has to deal with too much signal strength.

Before the age of microprocessors, there were problems with the unintentional radiation from the local oscillators in passenger-carried FM broadcast receivers jamming the radio equipment on aircraft.

It looks like the lessons havn't been learned. Such problems should have been discovered at the prototype stage of the consumer device...

Re:airline security is apparently still lacking

[radish]

I don't think it's only United, every airline I've flown on in the lats few years have explicitly mentioned that you muct switch phones off. I agree with what you say re: interference, but however small, it is a risk. There was a crash of a small jet liner in Switzerland a couple of years ago, which was blamed on a cellphone by the official investigation. Sorry, don't have any details, I think it was a CrossAir flight.

This will not work

[david_e_v]

The thing is that, if you really want your laptop to emit these UWB, you can do it (you don't have to power off your laptop even if you have it in its case, you know).
If there is really a case against the USE of laptops within the airplanes, there is an absolute need for some kind of screening system (we should be forced to put our laptops in special cases). If not, then this is just another case of false sense of security, and all this discussion is nonsense.

Re:This is funny...

[tomknight]

So you're suggesting that flight crews should have to learn all about laptop (etc) configurations, and then check them all off? I know banning them's silly, but please, get real!

Tom.

Re:Get real! Take me to x or i'll unplug my headph

[Memetic]

Ridiculous, banning headphones will not solve this, they are an innocent party, we need to get rid of the passengers....

Re:Uh, oh.

[tomknight]

But the problem here is the management suits who are too think to realise that cool optional extra they have in their lovely new laptop is the thing they've just been told to turn off.

Tom.

Are they making that much money on the headphones?

[ellem]

I mean, really, what this is really about is the airlines losing the 5-10 bucks they charge for those headphones so you can watch those sorry ass movies on crappy VHS.

What they really want to ban is DVD players!

Shurely you can tell...

[Kragg]

When your collision system bluescreens??

Re:"business men" only pretending anyway...

[mccalli]

Whenever I see a business man "working" on a flight he is usually just trying to look cool

Yep.

A really good way to annoy them is to get out your laptop, which for preference should either be or at least appear to be better specified than theirs, and then just relax, chill out and start watching a film on the DVD player. Added bonus points if the battery can outlast theirs as well.

Works every time on the trains I take between London and Sheffield.

Cheers,
Ian

(Don't miss my new bestseller: "Businessmen Baiting for Fun & Profit", available from Amazon real soon now)

Re:what's new?

[plumby]

I've flown both EasyJet and Go in the past 6 months and neither mentioned anything about this on any of those flights (except for during takeoff/landing).

Re:Make a sentence out of: monkey, key, banana-far

[StandardDeviant]

... [I]n the real world ... geeks rarely inspire terror...

Oh, I don't know about that. Ever watched undegraduates getting handed (back) exams from a physics/math/CS/EE TA?

(Someone who not only spent 4-5 years of their life muttering equations to get a B.Sc./B.Eng., then decided to spend 2 to 7 more years doing the same for low pay... By any definition, a geek^H^H^H^H somebody who loves their field.)

}:-)

Fly naked

[jukal]

Actually, about everything you carry or wear might pose a risk to the plane. Imagine the electric shocks you can generate by wearing cheap nylon clothes and trying to find a good position in the lousy seat for 12 hours. The solution is simple: fly naked. Business classers could have a turkish sauna.

This method could be first field-tested by a volunteer group of female flight stewards.

Re:Fly naked

[G-funk]

This method could be first field-tested by a volunteer group of female flight stewards. ...erm... and ME :)

Re:Fly naked

[ajs]

Flying naked is not sufficient, and the FAA has known that for at least a decade! What we need is to strap people down into a small box that you then enclose in a sound-proof faraday cage. I'm disgusted that we fail to take these precautions. When will Washington wake up and understand that security is all-important because children are at risk!!!

We also need to get luggage off of airplanes. It should be shipped by train and pass through customs, even for domestic travel.

Consider this a modest proposal. :-/

Re:Fly naked

[clickety6]

Think "fly naked"

Think "hot, fresh coffee"

Think "Turbulence"

I think not !

I'm not scared of flying..

[CoderByBirth]

...but I'm still a bit amazed at how lightly people take issues like this.

Your sitting in a metal crate with two giant combustion engines delivering an insane amount of power to get you off ground.
A plane consists of several thousand electronic, mechanical, and electromechanical systems, a zillion bolts and hundreds of tonnes of lightweight metal. And any single part of this giant system might fail at any time.

The fact that accidents don't happen more often than they actually do must be considered an engineering miracle.

So, you can't smoke and sip a gin&tonic while writing some shitty design document nobody cares about and which you might as well write when you get there?
Boo-fucking-hooo

Read a book.

Re:I'm not scared of flying..

[Sycraft-fu]

"The fact that accidents don't happen more often than they actually do must be considered an engineering miracle."

No, it's considered GOOD engineering. Believe it or not most of the high paid safety engineers that work on these things are not people that just assume that nothing bad will happen. Quite the opposite, they assume EVERYTHING bad will happen, and engineer for that. There are backups, failsafes, etc, etc. That, and the planes are checked and serviced all the time to ensure that all those systems are working as they should.

The airline construction industry is NOT the comptuer industry, they don't jsut slap something together and see how it works in the real world. They design and test, and test, and test, and test.

It takes a long time for a plane to be fully designed and tested, they have plenty of redundancy, and they are contiunally checked for failures. It is no miracle they don't fail often, it is good design and matenence.

Re:I'm not scared of flying..

[JimPooley]

What he said.

Even small training aircraft such as the one I'm learning to fly in have redundancy of vital systems - two fuel pumps, two ignition systems, two radios.

Aviation is very conservative. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" appears to be the motto. Any new development has to be proven to be just as safe as what is currently in use and fully ratified by the aviation authority of the country in question, i.e. the CAA in the UK, the FAA in the USA. So a new development in avionics can take years to come into practical use.

That said, the technology is filtering down, so now you're finding light aircraft with glass cockpits (i.e. LCD instrument panels instead of dials), sidesticks, TCAS, HUDs etc.

Re:I'm not scared of flying..

[jafuser]

Hey Harry, you know we're sitting on four million pounds of fuel, one nuclear weapon and a thing that has two hundred thousand moving parts built by the lowest bidder. Makes you feel good doesn't it?

Re:I'm not scared of flying..

[gsfprez]

people take issues like this lightly because no one seriously believes that cell phones could bring down airplanes.

Good Lord - the passengers on the flights on 9 Sept. were ALL using their cell phones.. i'm just shocked that the handwringing euros of the world like you haven't taken the opportunity to blame the cell phones for what happened instead of the muslim terrorists (you've blamed everyone else but them)

Seriosly - if you *really* thought for one moment that the guy in the cheap suit next to you had forget to turn off his cell phone : and therefore spell your doom - would you REALLY get on the plane.

of course not. And that's because the engineers (both Boeing and the French ones) have worked it out so that it WON'T happen.

Re:I'm not scared of flying..

[mrm677]

There are backups, failsafes, etc, etc. That, and the planes are checked and serviced all the time to ensure that all those systems are working as they should.

Funny you say this. On my last flight from Chicago to San Francisco about a month ago, we were delayed because of a warning indicator in the cockpit. 30 minutes later, the pilot says over the intercom "Folks, the reason for our delay is a failed backup system causing a warning light on our flight information system. The mechanics have disabled the backup system so we will be taxiing for takeoff shortly".

Myself and a few others gasped, and I said a quick prayer and went to sleep.

BTW- this was a United Airlines flight on a Boeing 777

Using the same logic:

[BigBir3d]

All people are now banned from flights, as the security crews are not able to tell the difference between terrorists and regular passengers.

This is how the slide starts....

Re:A solution?

[biglig2]

Any experts ouit there able to explain why they don't shield the cabin? I mean, if train companies can make carriges that block mobile phone signales, why can't they do it with plains? Or is it a case that they can, but don;t want to retrofit it to their older planes? Do brand new planes have shielding in place?

Oh, and another thing, has interference from a device ever caused a problem?

This is why the old air traffic control works

[thogard]

ATC on many parts of the US and world is based on allocation of large amounts of air space for fixed times just like the old railroad lines. Its designed so that radio failure isn't a problem. Now that a generation of programmers have read Booch's book on OOD and know how to do air trafic control better than the old system we get all these new systems that work as long as all the gear works.

Old the system made use of paper strips that track the planes. The cool thing about the paper system is that when the power goes out or the scope reboots or whatever, the controller has a bunch of paper strips to look at and know whats going on. All the controller needs is a radio and they can get all the planes down.

Australia has a "modern" ATC system and I've got to talk to three different people to groups to fly into the general aviation airoport in Melbourne if I come from the north. In the US, that would be two. The controllers here out number the ones in the US and can't cope with a much lighter load. The new system for London has had major issues since it was turned on.

General rules for programming have been discovered. Most of them have been used in the Kansas City freight yards for a long time.--Derrick Lehmer (1949) from Knuth Vol1

Re:This is why the old air traffic control works

[mpe]

ATC on many parts of the US and world is based on allocation of large amounts of air space for fixed times just like the old railroad lines.

Problem is that aircraft arn't trains. Also in old rail systems the trains would carry tokens, sometimes keys to unlock signalling systems.

Its designed so that radio failure isn't a problem.

Except that radio failure is considered an emergency, for very good reason.

TCAS and ILS and terrorists with telephones

[tlambert]

If this were really an issue, we would be seeing terrorists with small devices built into cell phone cases that were built using a switch, a battery, a capacitor, a coil, an electromechanical relay, and a large antenna loop: a spark gap generator, of the type one makes from Radio Shack project kits.

Or, they would just have cell phones, since they are also supposedly a source of interference with something other than AirFone revenues ;^)).

In reality, this article is _mostly_ bogus.

The ILS (Instrument Landing System) is vulnerable to electronic interference, mostly because it is an incredibly ancient implementation, and has not yet been replaced with anything designed in the last two decades.

The antique ILS in even the most modern aircraft is why you can't use electronic equipment during takeoff and landing (landing is obvious; so's takeoff, if you realize that it might have to be aborted, in which case it turns into a landing).

Most airports, however, are in urban areas, with a high telephone cell density. If this were ever a real issue, we would see aircraft dropping out of the sky as they flew over any urban area. SFO, PHX, and SLC tend to have a higher than average instrument requirement (the first for fog, the second two for temperature inversion based wind shear; want to vomit? Fly Tucson to Phoneix. SLC also has snow visibility issues in winter). For most airports, the systems are largely ignored. SLC has an upgraded system that ~60% of modern planes can use, actually; it's a deployment issue.

The TCAS (Traffic Collision Avoidance System) is actually based on paired receivers. It's succeptable to powerful broad-band interferences; "powerful", in this case, means "orders of magnitude higher than the those currently permitted for use in UWB devices".

The failure you would see (and you would probably need a specially manufactured transmitter to see it) would be a 180 degree polar flip (i.e. if the transponder you cared about were 23 degrees down and 17 degrees right, it would read as 157 degrees up and 163 degrees left). This actually happens a lot, and the hardware is built to automatically compensate through multiple samples (i.e. sustained interference is required).

The fix for this is to go to trios instead of pairs of receivers.

As we saw just the other week, though, TCAS itself is generally ignored in favor of ground instructions, we lost two planes in a collision in Germany specifically because TCAS was ignored.

Given that TCAS is almost never used, anyway, because the controllers keep the planes far enough apart, the interference is isn't likely to be an issue.

In any case, I think the overall concern is a result of the fear of out-of-spec devices, which met emissions at the time of manufacture, and have since, for whatever reason, ended if with a much higher signal strength.

Personally, I think they are worried over nothing: it's just an uncommenly slow news day, what with most of the U.S. shut down for Labor Day...

-- Terry

Re:TCAS and ILS and terrorists with telephones

[mcelrath]

The reason they want you to turn off electronic devices during takeoff and landing has nothing to do with navigational interference. The flight crew wants you alert and responsive in case of an emergency (i.e. not unable to hear them because you're wearing headphones cranked up to volume level 10). The feed us this line of bullshit because if they told you at the beginning that 95% of airline accidents occur at takeoff and landing, they'd scare the shit out of the passengers. So instead they make up this excuse about electronic equipment to placate the sheeple. Frankly though its dumb because there's nothing to stop you from putting in your earplugs and sleeping mask.

Some airlines in Europe won't let you use CD players, on the exact same aircraft used by US carriers that do let you use CD players.

They should treat us like intelligent human beings...but I digress...

If your walkman did interfere with the navigation system, they would probably ban them for the entire flight, as this article suggests for UWB devices. (and rightfully so, IMHO -- though I will be pissed if they tell me I can't bring my laptop) The FCC regulates the EM frequency spectrum for exactly this purpose...to prevent interference. The ILS in planes does not use the same frequencies as your cell phone. If random EM emission was a problem, they would never allow computers on board. (Do you have any idea how much EMF your average computer puts out? It's HUGE!)

The other thing to realize is that the head of the FAA is a political appointment. The person in that position has never had any experience with flying planes or security. This is why they thought asking you if you had unknown crap in your bag was an effective security measure.

-- Bob

Updating planes

[ianscot]

To give you an idea of how resistant the airline industry is to common-sense upgrades to plane equipment, one of the old Ask the Pilot columns on Salon explained the cause of a runway collision that lost something like 500 lives. The radios they use in cockpits are walkie-talkie style, so when you're talking you can't hear anyone talk to you. One plane didn't hear the other saying it was still on the runway, because they both spoke at the same time.

Seems like UWF devices will get in line by the time they're commercial, according to the article, so fine. But expecting the airline industry to train all its underpaid flight attendants to screen laptops would be a big expense in resources, and it sounds like they should really spend that money elsewhere, on some basics.

Re:Updating planes

[gorilla]

You're talking about the collision between KLM Flight 4805 and PanAm Flight 1736 at Tenerife on 27 MAR 1977. This is the worst aircraft accident of all time, involving two 747's, all 248 people on board the KLM, and 335 out of 396 on board the PanAm died. The cause of that accident was KLM starting it's take off without clearance. KLM did hear the tower send "Papa Alpha 1736 report runway clear.", and the PanAm cockpit return "OK, will report when we're clear". These two singals were enough to give the KLM flight engineer enough concern to ask the captain "Is he not clear then?", but the KLM captain overruled him. The radio collision was between the tower & the PanAm cockpit, not the KLM's cockpit, and therefore has little in common with walkie-talkies. The offical probable cause was therefore:

PROBABLE CAUSE: "The KLM aircraft had taken off without take-off clearance, in the absolute conviction that this clearance had been obtained, which was the result of a misunderstanding between the tower and the KLM aircraft. This misunderstanding had arisen from the mutual use of usual terminology which, however, gave rise to misinterpretation. In combination with a number of other coinciding circumstances, the premature take-off of the KLM aircraft resulted in a collision with the Pan Am aircraft, because the latter was still on the runway since it had missed the correct intersection."

Re:Updating planes

[mpe]

To give you an idea of how resistant the airline industry is to common-sense upgrades to plane equipment, one of the old Ask the Pilot columns [salon.com] on Salon explained the cause of a runway collision that lost something like 500 lives. The radios they use in cockpits are walkie-talkie style, so when you're talking you can't hear anyone talk to you. One plane didn't hear the other saying it was still on the runway, because they both spoke at the same time.

Whilst better radios might have helped the KLM captain should not have assumed that the Pan Am aircraft was clear. He should have assumed that the runway was in use until he had heard otherwise. Someone who drove a car at speed into thick fog would be considered a complete fool. The same must apply to someone doing the same with a 747.

Re:Updating planes

[ianscot]

The airline industry has a lot of "safeties" set up, and they're quite elaborate, but in this particular case one of their levels of protection failed because of the lack of true two-way communication on their cockpit radios. That's not that high-tech a problem, and they have an example, the worst example possible, of how its not being there at least contributed to the deaths of a lot of people, but they haven't addressed it.

No, I'm not arguing that the radio thing was the primary cause of the accident, but it contributed to it, and it could be fixed pretty simply. According to the Salon columnist, anyway, it hasn't been. Which suggests to me, anyway, that despite very sincere and thorough measures taken toward airline safety, the industry isn't necessarily as tech-savvy as it'd need to be to train attendants about laptops with a particular networking ability. Simple point, and I'm not claiming to be any sort of expert, but people here were saying "just educate the airlines about the laptops," and that seems like the bass-ackwards approach.

Yesterday an 80 yo man was fined

[gelfling]

For shrugging off a command to open up and take everyting out of his wallet. He did it but his verbal response was "Yeah you got me I keep a rifle in there."

It was on MSNBC I think. Coupled with airlines now charging up to $80 per bag to check the bag if it's over an arbitrary size and basically what you have is an industry that is committed to committing suicide. At this rate there will be 1 or 2 Long Distance Airlines that only carry passengers overseas or long distances from coast to coast or internationally outside of western Europe. And everyone else will do anything but fly, which will costs thousands of dollars anyway.

It will be a return to the 1930's except we don't have trains in the US anymore so everyone will drive in Federally mandated 8 MPG land arks - one to an SUV by law. Once in a great while we'll look up and see a jet and it will seem as strange as seeing a hot air balloon or the Concorde today.

Re:Yesterday an 80 yo man was fined

[dackroyd]

Once in a great while we'll look up and see a jet and it will seem as strange as seeing a hot air balloon or the Concorde today.

I work under the flight approach to Heathrow and have a window (three in fact) facing the planes coming in, so I get to see(hear + feel, it is really loud) Concorde every couple of days.

Neener, neener, neener !

Re:Yesterday an 80 yo man was fined

[poot_rootbeer]

Coupled with airlines now charging up to $80 per bag to check the bag if it's over an arbitrary size and basically what you have is an industry that is committed to committing suicide.

This is nothing new; excess baggage has ALWAYS been subject to additional fees. If the industry were really intent to destroy itself, wouldn't it do exactly the opposite and allow passengers to bring as much luggage as they want for a flat price, no matter what the airline's expenses for transporting that luggage might be?

Did you hear that ticket agents will soon no longer waste time asking you if you packed your own bag and if the bag has left your sight at any time? It's true. There's no evidence that suggests any terrorism was ever averted because these questions were asked, so there's no reason to keep asking them.

The airline industry reacted to the flaws demonstrated on 9/11 by overreacting and clamping down hard on any potential exploit. This is to be expected. Now they're starting to get a feeling of which measures work and which don't, and the hardships of air travel will gradually be relaxed until flying is just as painless as it was before 9/11 -- but it will be safer.

Detection?

[GregWebb]

Why can't they just build a UWB receive-only box, stick one on the plane and yell at anyone who flashes up as sending out a signal?

Or, for that matter, build a better insulation system round the components before I just bring on a homemade electrical interference generator. Not difficult to generate RF noise, after all.

Vulnerability to RF attack

[dcavanaugh]

This problem goes way beyond WiFi PDAs. See this dated but still relevant description of RF-based attack. We're really stupid to rely on avionics systems that can be so easily disrupted. Its only a matter of time before this becomes big trouble.

Britan???? WTF?!

[Bassthang]

And people think Americans have no clue about the rest of the world. Surely not!

(And they also say you have no understanding of sarcasm or irony either. How could that possibly be?)

So who can easily tell if a laptop +UWM and - UWB

[supof2001]

Sure, it's easy to recognize a PCMCIA access device, but who here can easily recognize these devices when integreated into the computer. Sure, educate the flight attendant is one suggestion, but I don't think they should have to either a) learn all OSs in order to tell whether or not UWB software/drivers are installed and in use; or, b) partially dissasemble and recognized and UWB device by appearance. But, of course, as other people have been pointing out, UWB may start being in a variety of devices. What does this mean, no high-technology electronics on board at all?

Re:Teach the Dog

[Kamel Jockey]

The new security guards should be smarter in the United States at least, since they are Federals now, rather then high school dropouts or recent immigrants.

Umm... not quite... turns out the existing security guards were just "federalized", not replaced. In fact, a special exemption from the standard federal college degree requirement for civilian jobs was made so that these losers could become federal employees.

RTFA

[Observer]

The headline of the Register story was "CAA mulls ban on laptops which don't exist"; its first sentence says "Laptops may be banned..." (my emphasis).

It's a story picked up from the London-based Times, which apparently quotes the UK's Civial Aviation Authority as saying "more research is needed".

Throwing a few keywords at Google found this article in Aviation Week's online pages from June 17 amongst other stories. From this, it appears that the unexpected effects occured at much higher usage levels than would be typical in consumer devices and only under some usage scenarios. While it does sound as though the interaction between this new source of interference and aircraft electronics needs more investigation, gleeful /. extrapolations to hand-held open-spark transmitters appear unwarranted.

Relax. The sky isn't falling yet.

As a student pilot...

[dloyer]

As a student pilot I have found that most of the technology used in aircraft was developed more than 20 years ago and is VERY slow to change.

The non-military GPS signals used by aircraft for navigation are much weaker than the military versions that are designed to be jam resistant. They are little more than noise.

There is talk about shutting down the old VOR based network of radio navigation since most pilots would rather use GPS. However, concerns about possible jamming of GPS signals has delayed the VOR phase out.

Collision avoidance systems used in large comercial aircraft are based on transponder signals used by air traffic control, which are based on old WWII friend or foe systems. In order to scale up to high traffic levels, these systems now use a lot of signal processing that is noise senstive. Air traffic control sometimes see's "Ghost" aircraft that are artifacts of noise.

So, eletronic navigation and traffic detection used in aircraft, large and small are vulnerable to incrased electronic noise. It is not unreasable that new uses of spectrium must ensure compatibility with existing systems.

These aircraft systems will not change anytime soon. The industry is very slow to change due to the risk of loss of life and the lawsuits that would follow.

Re:Technology out of date?

[AndyChrist]

Why? They have to bring them in for maintenance anyways to replace the cockpit doors with something more secure. Why can't they make other fixes at the same time?

Because that door fix could probably be done in an hour. Tearing a plane apart to replace most of it's wiring would take considerably longer.

Mod +1 silly.

[Bishop]

Fortunately planes still have pilots who do the actuall piloting of the plane.

Re:A solution?

[Midnight Thunder]

You could probably add a cage around the passenger compartment, but refitting an existing air-craft is expensive and also takes time. Another problem is that the cage would add weight, thus burning more fuel. The person ending up carrying the cost would be the passenger, and if it cost more to fly on that plane, then they are likely to opt for another company, that isn't so concerned about safety. Banning the use of notebooks is cheap and quick to implement.

We will probably see aircraft in the future be notebook friendly, but in the meantime enjoy the time to rest your brain ;)

Re:Britan??

[henben]

Flamebait? What, is the spelling of "Britain" controversial now?

Look at the title of the article. They've put "Britan". Honestly.

Can't take it on, can't baggage it

[PhilHibbs]

When I flew to China, I was told that no battery-powered equipment was allowed in the hold. I would never send a laptop in as hold luggage, well ... not again anyway.

Ex-owner of a Toshiba Libretto.

Re:What's new? Use of computers is already banned.

[JimPooley]

Collision-avoidance and instrument landings systems seem to be critical only during takeoff and landing... Well, those two planes that collided lately were a long way from takeoff or landing. Admittedly the collision was mostly due to the pilot of one plane being told one thing by TCAS and another thing by traffic control, and obeying traffic control - which was wrong. But still anti-collision instruments are vital at all times. Most commercial flights are filtered along the same routes. Look at a flight map and you'll see 'Airways' which are high altitude routes banned to VFR pilots. These are regions of airspace for IFR traffic at altitude. i.e. airliners, small business jets, etc.

Re:WTF? Nasa?

[JimPooley]

Train your frickin personal. If someone cant tell theres an 802.11b card in a notebook then there just stupid.

Learn to spell 'PERSONNEL'. If someone can't use their apostrophes properly then they're just stupid.
Of course, surely everyone knows the exact specification of every laptop sold anywhere in the world, and has the ability to instantly identify any part of it at a glance.
And you try to present yourself as an intellectual superior when you have the linguistic ability of a seven year old?
Your signature reads 'Education, Not illimination'. Obviously you could do with some education yourself. Education in English. The word I think you're looking for there is 'illumination' perhaps? Oh, and you don't use a capital letter after a comma.
I don't want you serving me my drinks. You're obviously too young to drink, you certainly write as if you're too young.

Re:A solution?

[plover]

Frell the laptop users. The rest of us have to fly in that aluminum can, too.

The biggest threat to your health in the air is that of being hit by flying debris tossed about by a bit of random turbulence. And a 5 pound laptop is basically a large rock in those circumstances.

Check 'em all, I say. They can read a book or magazine, or even use <GASP>pen and paper</GASP> to get their last minute work done. (Of course, the latest Tom Clancy in hard cover flying about is almost as heavy, but it's probably not as aerodynamic as a laptop.)

And yes, I fly for business frequently.

Re:Technology out of date?

[AntiNorm]

The military must have systems which do the same job and don't suffer from the crippling effects of laptop and cellphone interference.

Military aviation uses a frequency range that is approximately double the frequency of civil aviation (i.e. about an octave higher). This would probably have some sort of effect on the EMI received from laptops, although changing the entire civil aviation system over to another frequency range would be far too much of a pain in the ass to be feasible.

Solve the real problem...

[slykens]

Why aren't avionics systems properly shielded to begin with? Sure, most of the designs are at least twenty years old, but that's not an excuse to not be protected from even the chance that some sort of RF or EMP attack is possible.

There's a story of how the US managed to capture a Soviet MIG sometime during the 70's (I think). They took it apart and found that the Soviets were still using vacuum tubes. The problem was not that the Soviets couldn't use microchips. They chose vacuum tubes to protect against EMP and to not have the added weight of shielding. I am not suggesting we retrofit modern airlines with vacuum tubes, what I am suggesting is that the dangers of RF and EMP attacks be properly accounted for, and if they currently are then to drop the bunk about "interference with navigation and communications systems."

Re:A solution?

[funky womble]

When blocking mobile phone signals they are usually just transmitting a signal on the same frequency at a higher amplitude than the phone.

You usually need a license to do that, which wouldn't normally be granted. (Ok, maybe you don't need one for a closed loop system).

But you don't need a license to enclose something in a Faraday cage (just more money, both in terms of installation costs, and running costs in the form of increased fuel use).

Re:This is funny...

[tomknight]

"How about a $20 hand-held detection device that will tell them if a signal is coming from one of the seats?"

...only if it make comical "Made for Hollywood" type sound effects and has a flashing light.

Seriously though, why would this be a bad idea??

Tom.

Typical crap

[pauldy]

Why fix the problem when you can get rid of whatever exploits the problem. Now how long before someone builds a device that looks like a pack of cigartes to scramble up these systems on purpose.

cellphones worked fine on flight 93

[peccary]

at least, up until right before the plane crashed. So I guess we don't really know whether the phones were dangerous to the avionics.

Mod braindead

[osolemirnix]

??
And since all the modern planes are fly-by-wire, if your electronics are screwed, so are you and your pilot (and the rest of the plane).

As a matter of fact, EMP or radio signals from a device physically on board a plane could easily yield the same final result as explosives and are so easy to get on board that I am very surprised no one has tried it yet.

The idea certainly doesn't make me feel any safer flying than all the stupid people too dumb to understand basic physics of cellphones and choosing to ignore announcements. I mean, which part of "Leave your phone completely switched off while on the plane." didn't they understand?

Re:Mod braindead

[Jobe_br]

Actually, wrong. As a software engineer who has worked on those very fly-by-wire systems, it is actually a fact that the pilot of a 'hi-tech' aircraft such as a 777 or 767-400ER (both very much fly-by-wire), can still fly the aircraft if all electronic systems were compromised, excluding mechanical systems such as hydraulics and such (i.e. if its physically possible to fly the plane, provided the proper inputs from the PFD, ND, EICAS, FMC, etc. systems - then the pilot can fly the plane *without* these inputs).

I basically had a senior engineer (and pilot) tell me, during one conversation, that with two pieces of tape stuck to the windshield, the pilot would be able to fly the plane.

Now, I'm not saying that this banning of all electronic devices, UWB or not is good or bad - I'm specifically responding to the claim that the pilot would be unable to fly the plane (successfully!) if the fly-by-wire systems failed. Such a scenario (being wholly dependent on the computers) would likely not receive approval from the FAA, btw.

Incidentally, if I may be allowed to weigh in on the topic at hand, it appears that the main threat of these UWB devices is that they override the signals being received by certain electronics in the plane, specifically the TCAS (traffic collision avoidance system), which receives transponders signals from nearby planes and provides information to the ND (navigational display) to map the location of an aircraft and its threat level (based on altitude, flight path and proximity). In this particular instance, the only sheilding that would be of any benefit would be sheilding the passenger cabin from everything. This, however, would be exceedingly difficult since antennae are located everywhere and *most* of the material currently used in the aircraft (including the windows, the floor, etc.) would need to be replaced with material that shields these signals. Never mind the retrofitting that would be necessary, such a solution is entirely intractable.

I'm not certain what the best solution for something like this is, but it would seem to me that the FCC isn't properly doing its job if its allowing devices to be created that cause interference outside of their immediate area. It should be the responsibility of the UWB emitting device manufacturer to ensure that within a radius of a foot or so from the device, the signal strength is inconsequential (e.g. below a threshold set by the FCC which is dictated by the minimum signal strength a TCAS system requires to register a "valid" signal). Obviously this doesn't protect against rogue devices, but that's not entirely hopeless: if a pilot notices his TCAS is malfunctioning, he'll likely declare an emergency situation or at the very least, turn back to his home airport (if its closest) and inform ATC (air traffic control) of his condition. ATC will then take it upon themselves to keep the sky clear around this aircraft and inform nearby aircrafts of the situation (not *really* necessary since their TCAS will still work since the afflicted system is still broadcasting TCAS information, it just can't receive it properly).

In the meantime, the pilot will announce on the PA that this situation is in progress, the flight attendants will check for any electronic devices - if this check fails, the plane will land and the ground crew will scan for the origin of the device and then track what person it belongs to, who can expect fines or other punishment for interfering with the airline.

Not entirely an unmanageable situation, you see. I find it very unlikely that someone will be able to universally kill TCAS around an airport and even so, TCAS is a last-ditch solution that prevents collisions. ATC's job is to prevent a situation from developing in which TCAS would even be used! Remember, not every aircraft in an airspace has TCAS - not by a long shot. A good deal of aircraft, both commercial and private, large and small, do not have TCAS systems! Obviously we still make do with the current situation!!

Hope this clears some confusion up!

Cheers.

Re:Mod braindead

[Jobe_br]

Ignoring the fact that this came from an AC, I'll just say that unless the attack is planned (which isn't the point of the thread at all), it is highly unlikely that a random UWB device will generate "useable" input data to TCAS that would create an erroneous RA. So yes, that would suck, but its highly unlikely. Considering TCAS doesn't work off radar or any other proximity sensing technology, it is wholly based on data transmitted from other TCAS enabled systems and TRUSTS that the information provided by these systems is legit. Its very unlikely that the necessary data to constitute a valid TCAS data packet would come in from UWB "noise" - I know this, I worked on the code that parses out the TCAS data and determines if its valid or not. Not to mention the CRCs and such that get applied to the data packets.

Now, as for flying conditions that require instruments - yes, these occur and to take into account these situations, careful thought ought to be applied. As for circling over the ocean for three hours, I imagine that the GPS driven FMC would keep the plane on course just fine, UWB jamming or not. And either way, I imagine the pilot will notice unusual course deviations, if the FMC system is indeed telling the Autopilot incorrect information. Most flight paths are straight - circling over the ocean wouldn't constitute a "normal" flight path, would it? Didn't think so.

Either way, my statement about the FCC regulating UWB emitting devices stands - if the only thing that needs to be worried about is "malicious" UWB devices, that can be addressed differently.

Re:WTF? Nasa?

[mpe]

Why is NASA spending money on this. To date neither Boeing 737 or 747 go into space. People wonder how the ISS goes over budget.

The first "A" covers aircraft, it's the "S" which covers space. Also they operate at least one 747.

Re:A blanket ban would be a little hypocritical...

[mpe]

As for the TCAS system, while it is mandated by the FAA (at least in the US), some may argue that it doesn't work all that well. [airdisaster.com] The pilots are told to follow the TCAS rather than ATC instructions. This has led to a few "interesting scenarios.

IIRC part of the problem is that some aircrews are trained to always take note of TCAS others are trained to follow ATC instructions.

However, while ATC usually keeps the aircraft apart, in high traffic areas TCAS can be useful. Especially when Joe pilot in his little Cessna flying VFR wanders across your approach unbeknownest to the tower. Of course visual awareness on the crews part is important there as well.

Unless either aircraft or ATC can track such a plane they are in real big trouble. The light aircraft can easily be tossed out of the sky even if it dosn't get that close to a big jet.

ATC Tech

[Raetsel]

• "...the fact that the U.S. ATC relies on "dated" technology may be the reason it's so successful."

Oh God, thank you. I needed a laugh! "US ATC" and "reliable" in the same sentence, with a straight face even!

To the regular person, I suppose ATC could be looked at as 'reliable' -- but go talk to a controller sometime; the people who have to present the aura of reliability when something fails. Ask him (or her) how often their radio breaks. Or how hard it is to get vacuum tubes for some of their equipment. Perhaps you could visit the vampires -- the people who sit in an almost completely dark room dealing with everything IFR (and VFR in controlled airspace). Everything is voice and paper -- it's a sobering sight. Yes, there is a lot of computerization, but the interaction goes

• Pilot (flight plan) -> computer -> piece of paper -> controller <-> pilot!
  (Note the heads on the arrows.)

It's a wonder these people stay sane sometimes.

Canada privatized their ATC system, and (to an outsider) it has worked quite well. Communications systems are much better. The controllers don't have to keep track of planes on slips of paper, they can actually interact with the computer. One has to consider, however, that Canada doesn't deal with nearly the same daily volume of aircraft that the United States does, so their successes may not scale the way we'd need.

I must admit that the last time I was in an ATC facility was before the whole Y2K thing, and a lot of money was spent to upgrade things for that particular scare. Perhaps things are better now, but ATC doesn't live on internet time -- so I doubt it.

Re:ATC Tech

[DNS-and-BIND]

The pen-and-paper system works, and works every time, does it not? That's more than could be said of a PC-based ATC running visual basic apps. I feel a lot better knowing my fate is in the hands of men with green screens and pencils than I would if they were sporting dirty mouseballs and windows keyboards.

Re:Technology out of date?

[mpe]

They have to bring them in for maintenance anyways to replace the cockpit doors with something more secure. Why can't they make other fixes at the same time?

Replacing an interior door isn't a major maintenance task on an aircraft. Replacing the wiring and electronics would require an HMV (heavy maintanance visit) which more or less involves taking the plane to bits and putting it back together.

Re:A solution?

[sphealey]

The article also states that UWB devices are unlikely to appear in consumer devices much before 2004, giving plenty of time for appropriate standards to be set to avoid such problems. It's not a big deal.

Two minor problems:

• The kind of executive techno-geeks who use cutting edge devices are also the ones most likely to be taking a lot of commercial flights

• It takes about 15 years to get a new standards for electronics created, passed, and installed throughout the commercial airline fleet. A new standard that required a lot of additional shielding and rewiring could take 30 years and cost hundreds of billions.

sPh

Re:Teach the Dog

[pauldy]

Why is everyone acting like such a simpleton about this? They need to fix the equipment that these otherwise generally used products would interfere with. They can come up with policies and procedures all day and it won't fix the fact that obviously this equipment needs to be replaced and it needs to be done now! I would support a momentary ban on electrical devices while the refitted the planes with new equipment. But the possible blanket ban on everything is getting a bit ridiculous because what it comes to now is any fruit lop with a battery and wire can f-up the planes electronic fail safes now how smart is it to keep the problem but try and eliminate anything we know might exploit it. Anyone thinking of ways to allow laptop usage while keeping the true problem isn't thinking at all.

But you discount the effect on demand

[gelfling]

However efficient it is financially for the carriers if they insist on making everything more expensive and more unpleasant - that is unless people really don't mind paying for their own cavity searches then the carriers will whither and die.

Here's the actual story

[Animats]

From Flight International (18 JUN 2002):

• Ultra-wideband interferes with avionics, tests show

  United Airlines says UWB devices led to failure of major systems, despite FCC approval Preliminary tests of ultra wideband (VWB) transmissions have led to failures in aircraft avionics, including the traffic alert and collision avoidance system (TCAS), instrument landing system (ILS) localiser, and glideslope (GS), United Airlines has revealed. The results support airline and general aviation operator's claims that UWB devices, approved this year by the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), pose a danger to aircraft systems. Radio communications and VOR navigation beacons were not affected during the tests, which were conducted by NASA's Langley Research Center and Victorville, California-based Eagle Wings on Boeing 737-2OOs and 747-400s. "At intentional emission levels set by the FCC we are observing critical flight systems anomalies from a single UWB device," says James Miller, United's flight operations technology department programme manager, who represents the US aviation industry on UWB issues.

  Researchers operated a UWB chip at varying distances from avionics system antennas outside the aircraft and in several interior locations; The chip transmitted at the maximum power level set by the FCC. The communication and navigation systems broadcast at the lowest levels permitted by the International Civil Aviation Organisation. When operating the chip outside the aircraft, NASA says, the TCAS tail light came on, its display indicator turned off and the targets disappeared off the screen. At lower UWB strength (inside the aircraft), says NASA, "the warning light did not come on, but the targets disappeared off the screen. It spoofed the system without any direct warning to the pilot." The UWB source also caused erratic motion and retraction of the GS bar and pointer, and extension of the GS failure flag while transmitting outside the aircraft. These effects were not observed while transmitting inside the passenger cabin. The source also caused uncommanded motion and blanking of the ILS localiser course deviation indicator bar on the horizontal situation display. UWB devices will broadcast weak signals over vast swathes of the aeronautical spectrum. Miller insists that the new FCC regulation "allows unlicensed consumer devices to intentionally radiate into [safety-critical aeronautical] bands under the guise that UWB is not powerful enough to interfere. Any pilot will tell you that injecting any level of interference into the cockpit is an unacceptable consequence of FCC rule making."

Losing TCAS is bad. Losing the ILS localizer and glideslope during approach is worse; that's the primary bad-weather landing aid. Yes, ILS failure only occured with the UWB unit outside the cabin, but this was with only one UWB unit transmitting. TCAS failure occured with a UWB unit inside the cabin, which is unsuprising; it's receiving signals from other aircraft, while ILS is receiving signals from major ground stations with plenty of power.

UWB transmitters need to be filtered to keep them out of the aeronautical bands. They probably shouldn't be emitting any measureable power below 3GHz or so.

Faraday Cage?

[Omega]

This may seem a little naive, but why not just enclose the passenger cabin in a Faraday cage? Something like chicken wire should do fine. It could easily be concealed behind the wallpaper, carpet and overhead bins. Admittedly you'd have to do something about the windows, but this could easily seal-in most EM signals which harm airplane navigation systems (including cell phones).

Or is there some reason for putting radio navigation receiving equipment in the passenger cabin?

WiFi is not UWB

[Eric Smith]

This problem goes way beyond WiFi PDAs.

It certainly does, considering that WiFi (802.11b) does not use UWB. WiFi uses conventional spread-spectrum over a relatively narrow band.

This is also true of 802.11a and 802.11g, although 802.11a uses the 5 GHz band rather than the 2.4 GHz band used by 802.11b and 802.11g.

What consumer devices actually use UWB? I haven't yet heard of any.

Re:A solution?

[GMontag451]

The reason cell phones aren't allowed to be used in aircraft isn't because you are endangering the aircraft, its because you are endangering the cell phone network. When you are on the ground, your phone can generally only see one or two cell stations, but when you are in the air, you have line of sight to tons and tons of them. This produces an immense strain on the cell phone network, especially when you have many people using them at once.

Re:A solution?

[rodgerd]

Plane avionics run through the plane, not just the cabin.

Here's a better question: Can anyone explain which dumbass thought it would be a good idea to develop a wireless standard that could knock a jet out of the air?

Re:A solution?

[iangoldby]

Maybe you missed my point. It is not and should not be the planes that need to change. It is the UWB implementations themselves that need to be right. If a UWB device causes measurable interference, then it simply shouldn't be used anywhere that interference might matter.

The promise of UWB is that the interference they put out is insignificant to other devices. If that is so, then all well and good. But if they do cause interference, then surely would be extremely irresponsible to use them anywhere that might matter, whether it is on an aircraft, or near someone using a mobile phone, or wherever else.