Slashdot Mirror
Research: Mobile Phones Disrupt Aircraft
threeturn writes "Another contribution to the ever-popular "mobiles on planes" topic. Every time this is discussed on /. lots of people say "there is no danger - its just the airlines trying to make a buck on their skyphones". Well, now the UK Civil Aviation Authority has done some research which shows mobiles on planes do disrupt safety systems and interfere with compass readings and other navigation equipment. Also reported by the BBC. So do us all a favour and switch your mobiles off next time you fly."
I'd REALLY REALLY REALLY like to see Boeing, Airbus et al. installing avionics and comms systems that can't be disrupted by ubiquitous and nearly free techno-gadgets.
It was a joke! When you give me that look it was a joke.
It seems odd to me that there would be this much discussion on the topic. While it may not be a cut-and-dry issue it would seem that it could be determined rather quickly via research whether mobile phones cause interference or not.
Why go back and forth on the issue?
Note: Of course I don't know all of the facts on the subject so I could be missing something (different plane models are affected differently, etc.)
As with the sun's light
My mom was magnificent
Unquestionable
Are they giving ideas to wannabe-terrorists?
But even if they aren't, now "the bad guys" don't even need a gun or knife, just a small electric device to cause much damage...
um, on the point of it being a plot to make you use their expensive sky phones...
would one even get reception up there? not only up there - but in there (metal cylinder)?
This is not an unsolvable technical problem.
Just an expensive one.
To anyone that desperate to use their cell phone on a plane - would you prefer to pay the exorbitant sky-phone rates, or the increase in ticket prices introduced to cover the installation of the shielding (and test procedures) necessary to make flight systems safe in the presence of cell-phone caused interference?
I tend to agree in that I find the wisdom of flying aircraft that can be interfered with by an every day gizmo a little questionable. I talked to a pilot about this a while back and he said that yes, it's true, the cabling is not very shielded, so sometimes even laptops in mid-flight can cause instruments/radio to flake out a little, since the EM tends to bounce all around inside the metal hollow cylinder you're in.
Has anyone ever left their phone on anyway and checked their signal strength at 35,000 feet?
I had a sucky sig.
If airplanes are already sensitive to the not so dramatic electromagnetic impact of simple little mobil phones, what would that mean to somebody who in act of terrorism wants to make strong em. impact on purpose?
--
Karma 50, and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt.
Exactly. A friend of mine who is a pilot, has forgotten to turn his off a few times when he goes flying. His battery is just about gone after only an hour in the air.
No problems getting reception up to 3000 ft, but you get LOTS of extra transmissions switching from tower to tower.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
I used to be firmly against the interference argument - until one day at work I heard my hardline phone making all kinds of weird buzzings and beepings. Oddly enough, they sounded identical to the noise I occasionally get on my cell phone. The cell phone, not surprisingly, was sitting right next to my hardline phone. After moving my cell to various positions, I discovered that it does indeed interfere with my hardline phone. When I moved the cell away the periodic noises stopped, and when I placed it next to the phone the noises began again.
Now, I seriously doubt my phone operates anywhere near the band that my cell uses, but for some reason the cell manages to interfere. Based on the outcome of this little experiment, I would definitely believe that cells could interfere with other systems - including aircraft systems - even though it may seem counterintuitive.
Imagine the area of towers you could hit at 30,000ft in the sky.
not many at all.
First Cell site antenna array's are high gain and therefore squeeze the signal to the horizon, second they tilt the antennas downward to limit the cell sites coverage in regards to adjacent cell sites.
It amazes me how many times this comes up on cellphone doscussions and how suprising it is to find how many people have no clue as to the basics of how a cellsite operates.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
No, it was British politicians and journalists. British scientists good ( think magnetrons, radar, penicillin ) British politicians useless (think WW1, WW2, dithering on whether closer to US/Europe - hint, guys, 3000 miles versus 20 - crime, vandalism, economic backwardness). British journalists - don't get me started.
Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
When I was working on wireless tech, and had to sit on industry consortium meetings on various initiatives for this type of stuff. One idea that was being passed around was to have an access point on the aircraft that would broadcast a 'forbidden' command to all the wireless devices which would tell them to play nice. iow - the plane would be a 'forbidden zone' where the device would know that it was not allowed to broadcast certain signals. IR would be okay, but bluetooth, 802.11[abg], cell phones, etc. would be right out. This could also be used in signal sensitive places like hospitals, etc.
"Stop whining!" - Arnold, as Mr. Kimble
Not only that, but have you ever sat next to some schmuck who feels he has make a call as soon as the wheels hit the ground? And we're not talking some urgent business communication - it's more like "yeah, we just landed... I think I'll grab a burger and be there in an hour... yada yada yada..."
I say, install automatic detection systems for wireless devices, identify the location of the phone and put it on the screen for all passengers to see. Let them then decide what to do about it - I think after a few blanket parties the message will get around!
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
I'm sure not every airplane is susceptible to interference from every phone; but it's obvious that some airplanes and some components are susceptible. As a pilot, if the compass swings or the autopilot tracks off in some weird direction, it would be difficult with the equipment currently installed on most aircraft, to determine that it was because of the phone call going on in first class.
Cell phones are worse for this sort of thing than say, a Gameboy, because the cell phone is built to be a transmitter. Sure, other devices will emit some rf; but the cell phones are designed to do so.
I remember my first cell phone came with a warning to turn it off when driving by construction sites where blasting was going on. There was some fear that a signal from the phone could cause problems with the equipment they were using to set off dynamite.
I'm not sure I buy the whole thing about cell phones causing fires at gas stations; but I also wouldn't call it impossible.
As for the airplane, it certainly can swing the compass; and its effects on VOR/OBS equipment are demonstrable.
I don't get why it's so hard to believe. Most of these airplanes were designed long before cell phones and laptops were the norm. It wasn't a danger anybody had conceived of. If we want to build the new airplanes to be immune to these effects, that's great (and I suspect we already do so with the new airplanes); but retrofitting the wiring harnesses, etc. on old airplanes is not tenable. All you have to do is take that already obnoxious thing out of your ear for a while. Consider the airplane sanctuary from your phone. You not only have a reason for turning it off, you have a responsibility.
Hot Damn! It's the Soggy Bottom Boys!
at least according to the bbc article.
...
It found evidence that calls produced interference levels which could disrupt aircraft systems. Faults that could be attributed to mobile phones use include
I see a lot of "coulds" and not a single "did". So what they found was that they have no better information now than they did before. Did they observe a single instance where there was interference? It's seems highly dubious that they couldn't construct a scenerio where they could conclusively show this "error".
And it's been stated before but I think it's worth mentioning again. By god, if cell phones are really capable of such chaos, why on earth do they allow them on the planes to begin with? Just what I need is to have someone bring down my plane because they forgot their phone was on in their briefcase, or 6 members of some terrorist org only need to start sms'ing each other to take down a 747 full of people. There is a severe disconnect between what the FAA is claiming and their actions taken. What, I have 5 people make sure I don't bring finger nail clippers onto the plane, but no one cares that I can bring the entire thing down with my Nokia?
Taking the article at face value, which I do, cellphone use really is a hazard. But simply asking people to turn of their cell phones probably isn't good enough.
I'm perfectly cooperative, but on my last plane flight I had put my cell phone in my backpack, put the backpack in the overhead luggage, honestly thought it was turned off, and after landing discovered I had left it turned on.
What does a cell phone do when it's powered on but not being used to make or receive calls? Does it transmit occasionally and spontaneously?
So the next question is: without suggesting any draconian measures, is there any good way that flight staff can _detect_ that there's a powered-up cell phone on board--so that they can politely tell the flyer to turn it off?
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
You see signs in gas stations requesting that mobile phones be switched off.
Is there any research to prove that this is a real danger?
I got a letter from Orange once, complaining about my phone jamming six adjacent cells (two cells that normally can't see each other suddenly both get the same phone at the same time). This was from having my phone switched on in an aircraft at around 3,500 feet.
As I recall, we couldn't get much momentum on the idea. Mainly because it wasn't a revenue point - which contrary to popular belief is what drives these types of projects. Anyhow, the ap would only need power from the aircraft to function. And since they airframe-strip planes every so often (can't recall the number of flight hours), its a simple matter to install them. And yes, the protocols would have to be augmented to either adopt the function, or a new protocol would have to be defined. I lobbied for the latter, since it would be easier for existing products to support 'friendly wireless protocol a', than having to upgrade to 802.11b.1, or whatever. Also, you avoid problems with IEEE, ISO, etc. having to augment their protocols.
"Stop whining!" - Arnold, as Mr. Kimble
Fine, so cell phones really do disrupt airplanes. I still don't believe it, but, if it's true then we've identified an exploit that needs to be fixed. "Please turn off your cellphone" is not a fix.
"Software company X has identified a buffer overflow in our popular Y software, which can lead to a remote root exploit. Rather than fixing it, we're asking that you please don't connect to port yz and send a string that is 5000 characters long and ends with the binary sequence..."
Moronic. Fix the bug and quit boring us with the details.
Michael
Do you have ESP?
What does this mean with regard to towers? How far aways from a cell phone tower do you have to be before the field strength is less than 30v/cm? Towers are now ubiquitous, how could an airplane make an approach in a major city without flying too close to a tower?
It would be interesting to find out. In the US, with the advent of Air Marshals, even the smallest infractions are now enforced (a man was tackled and arrested by the Air Marshals for *wanting* to go to the bathroom while the seat belt sign was on. He had asked the flight attendant repeatedly to let him go, but never actually went...) The Article, which no one reads, talks about a man being sentenced to 12 months in prison in the UK for having his cell phone on (and not using it) during a flight.
I am annoyed to find out, however, that the whole thing is bogus. Once again "journalists" (what passes for them these days) misreport findings in an uncited study that was flawed in the first place. The study *did not* find that cell phones disrupt flights. They did not even use cell phones for their tests. So the science behind this simply is not there.
This is my experience with (accidentally!) left on mobile phones (GSM variety) in aircraft.
I fly light aircraft. On a dark, rainy night, a friend and I was approaching Ronaldsway. My friend was the 'handling pilot' (i.e. the guy who's waggling the stick), and I was in charge of the radios - setting up frequencies, identing navaids, talking to ATC etc. Although our aircraft (a Grumman Cheetah) only requires one aircraft, we fly together reasonably often and find this arrangement works very well.
My friend was at the time a very new instrument pilot. Ceilings (the bases of the clouds) were about 800 feet, winds were light, and it was pelting with rain. It was about an hour after sunset.
We were just intercepting the localiser (the horizontal guidance part of the ILS - instrument landing system), and we had been cleared for the ILS approach.
Suddenly, the radio was blotted out with:
'Bip-b b b bip b b bip b b bip b b bip' - the highly recognisable radio interference from a GSM phone. My friend had forgotten to switch it off when we had taken off an hour and a half earlier. His wife was phoning him.
It completely blotted out the COM radio with the extremely loud 'Bip-b b bip b b bip bzzzzzzzzzzzz' noise as the phone went off. However, it did not intefere with the nav radios nor the compass - the localiser needle continued to behave how it should have, as did the other instruments (the direction indicator, for example, is gyroscopic) and it did not affect the compass. However, the noise was extremely distracting, and if ATC had any further instructions, we had no chance of hearing them until we got the phone shut off or my friend's wife hung up.
Fortunately, with two of us on board, it was a non-event (I could fly whilst my friend turned the phone off).
An important point to remember: aircraft fly on the rules of Bernoulli and Newton, not the rules of Marconi! It's perfectly possible to fly without radios. The problem is in instrument conditions (i.e. in the clouds) where you can't navigate by looking out the windows. Even so, a prudent pilot always plans an 'out' in case of radio failure, and does not bet their lives on the continued operation of the com and nav radios!
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
I'm not sure I buy the whole thing about cell phones causing fires at gas stations; but I also wouldn't call it impossible.
Well, I'm sure that there hasn't been a single reported case where cellular phones have been determined to cause a gas station fire. I'm also sure that Nokia attempted to cause a fire using a cellular phone in their labs, and were unable to. They kept a disclaimer about it because of public FUD and fear of being sued frivolously, say by a gas station fire victim that also happened to have a cellular phone. The best way to prevent gas station fires is to not have an open flame around the pumps (obviously) and to stay outside your car while filling up. (most people don't know this one) When people get into their cars to wait for the tank to fill, then get back out, they sometimes charge themselves statically. When they touch the metal pump handle, it may cause a small spark. In very rare cases, this can set off an explosion. Of course, you're more likely to have a rock fall on your head from space than to blow up at a gas station, but it *does* happen. Just hasn't happened due to cellular phones, and I for one would be extremely surprised if it *ever* did. Is it still *possible*? Sure, the same way that winning the powerball lottery 50 times in a row is *possible*. Don't spread FUD about this issue please. There's plenty of that in the world as it is.
I don't get why it's so hard to believe. Most of these airplanes were designed long before cell phones and laptops were the norm. It wasn't a danger anybody had conceived of.
yeah, interference only began with cellular phones! It was *never* a problem in electronics before that damned cellular phone was invented!
Look, I'm sure cost or laziness or 'we don't need it' or something prevented them from shielding the cables on commercial airlines. I'm sure it was a reason that looked good in the budget, or whatever. That doesn't get around the fact that it *could* have been done differently in the beginning, it just wasn't; now it's too expensive to retrofit. Does it matter whose fault it is? At this point a soultion would require not only retrofitting commercial aircraft, but also changing the way the cellular tower network is constructed, and possibly even the way the whole system works. That just isn't going to happen. Can't we just agree that even if you *could* use your phone without screwing up the plane, it would still be a very bad idea given our current cellular tower/network design, so it doesn't really matter?
http://xkcd.com/386/
I get more irritated at:
:)
1.) Those rugrats sitting behind me kicking the chair
2.) The lady next to me who keeps sleeping with her head on my shoulder.
3) The guy across the aisle who thinks I'm interested in his conversation.
4.) The screaming baby a few rows over.
5.) Those kids running up and down the aisles getting in everyone's way...
Same at a restaurant. I don't mind if someone is on the phone, so long as their ringer isn't loud and obnoxious. More often then not, I find more people in the restaurant who aren't on the phone, but talk/laugh really loud when talking to members at their own table...
And I can't believe how many times I go to see a movie at the theatre, and some moron brings their baby, and doesn't bother to leave when he/she starts crying. I also hate those kids that think its funny to point a laser pointer at the screen.
Believe me, chatting on the phone is the least of my irritations....
Look at the flight path of flight 93.
Does that suggest to you that the compass (etc) was working correctly?
I work in EMC (Electromagnetic Compliance), so we have two semi anechoic chambers (they absorb radio waves). In the 3 meter chamber, even with the radio absorption material, we have measured around 30v/m from a source signal strength of only 3v/m. How is this done? Well, the waves bounce off the walls where, at certain points in the room, they construct and destruct. This causes areas with very large signal strengths and some with extremely small signal strengths. Now remember, these walls are made to absorb the radio waves and this still happens. Just imagine if the walls weren't designed to absorb any!
/. (can't find via search engine) about the use of cell phones in passenger trains cars, about how the signals could add up to above the regulated levels. The same thing can happen in an airplane, but most likely worste because of the smaller windows. Now, just imagine if there was a sensetive piece of equipment that happened to be in one of the places where the signals added up very high...you would have a problem. I can understand why they don't want them in there. They could fix them by protecting the equipment more, or isolating the cabin from the equipment (which would most likely isolate you from your phone's network), but this would cost a lot. If I were them, there would be no motive for me since the planes already have usable phones that don't interfere (and create income).
There was a study some time ago posted here on