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Electronics & Planes Don't Mix?
dirtydamo writes "The Sydney Morning Herald is running an interesting story on the old debate on whether electronic devices cause problems on planes. It appears pilots are pretty much accustomed to handling weird problems with equipment, which they attribute to passengers' portable devices. More research is needed to determine whether or not this is the actual problem, but the article certainly makes me a little uneasy about modern air travel."
Say I need more tinfoil on my hat, but I don't doubt for a moment that terrorists somewhere are looking at a way to have a "martyr" on a plane disrupt the controls from the cabin using electronics. No overt attack neccesary; he would flip a switch, sit back and look forward to his 70 virgins that Allah[0] will be handing over in a few minutes while the crew futiley scramble around until the inevitable crash.
[0] Just an example, Islam != terrorism.
Trolling is a art,
Anyone with a laptop=possible terrorist, subject to immense scrutiny and background check.
C:\>
Just the other week we had the article on Slashdot about cell phones not working in planes.
And, after all, what's the big rush?
Planes are generally quiet places, where you can lie back, enjoy some wine, watch a movie in the front of your seat, have a wonderfully cooked meal.
I can even recline horizontally if I so choose.
What need do you have for electronics on that? I don't want a pager or a beeper or a celly going off in the middle of the air! Not to disturb my solitude!
And another thing, let's get rid of all these damn kids with gameboys.
70 virgins? Why don't they just enroll in college?
You get virgins, alcohol, [b]and[/b] meth.
Weren't folks on that plane using cellphones with no apparent problem? And I've seen DVD players for rent in airports as well.
Forget about screening for bombs - it's even scarier to think that you can bring down an airliner with a Game Boy.
When you're not looking, this sig is in Latin.
http://www.amazing1.com/emp.htm
Sad I have to post this anonymously.
Ahh yes, modern air travel, don't trust it.
The only actual research I'm aware of on this is an FAA study from the '90s. This article is a good summary: Cell phone use isn't banned by the FAA, but by the FCC in 1991, citing "cell phones' potential to interfere with ground-to-ground cellular transmission." Another web site explains, "at altitude, a cell phone will light up multiple cell towers and may cause the system to lock up." BS? The FAA is going to do another study and they don't seem too worried about "locking up the system."
"You've got to ask, do you want to get there, or do you want to use your laptop?"
Both. It's a million dollar aircraft, and the ticket is expensive. Figure out how to make it safe. When they find themselves asking questions like this, how can they wonder why they're having a hard time making money?
Can't they insulate all the sensitive equipment from the passenger section? Maybe have a layer of lead between the cockpit and the rest of the plane?
If things are really that bad, they're going to have to do something to address this, and soon. They need to harden the equipment against interference, and do it NOW.
A co-worker was using a wireless keyboard for his PDA, and was told by the flight attendant to not use it during flight. It was infrared, not RF. He tried to explain this to her, but she didn't get it, which is understandable, most non-geeks wouldn't. Solution: tape a piece of wire to it, and to his PDA, while in flight. :-)
Well, let me put it this way; do you want to spend several hours in a plane with a possible nudge to some direction or go through several hours of terror as yuppies break down and explode in front of you because they can't read their bloody email, can't act interesting by talking on their mobile nor can they look up contact they'll never meet on their PDAs. Well?
Hate me!
Why not test the device on the ground if the passenger wishes to use it in the air? Busy types will pay a premium for equipment certified to be safe and allowed for aircraft use.
Kids today are tyrants. They contradict their parent, gobble their food, and tyrannize their teachers. - Socrates 400 BC
but the article certainly makes me a little uneasy about modern air travel
Why? The article says the pilots are used to it and know how to filter it out. Plane crashes are very rare, and the ones that do happen are nearly always related to either weather or non-electronic equipment failure.
consumer electronic devices can cause problems with an aircraftssensitive equipment, couldn't it also be the possiblity that the planes own electronics are causing sporadic problems? Why the hell is suddley my game boy that caused the plane to crash, just because they don't have any other explanation.
Shop smart, Shop S-Mart.
I think their problem is a bit deeper than it seems...
I've always wondered why electronic equipment on planes was so much more sensitive then the regular stuff we have down on earth. I mean I can use my mobile phone near my computer and it doesn't lock up and vice versa, turning on my computer doesn't exactly make my mobile phone calls drop out. Electronic devices are specifically designed to withstand a certain amount of interferance, did somebody just forget to do that for plane electronics?
Just a note, airlines make money from people using in-flight phones, it's not in their economic interest to have people using their mobile phones.
Now, I know that not everything is as ideal a the FCC Part 15 rules are supposed to ensure, but really, do laptops really put out that much interference in the form of radio waves? How about mp3 players, or calculators, or e-book readers? I guess that what I'm wondering is how these devices are considered Part 15 if they wreak havoc upon aircraft electronics. Yes, I can see how an actual emitter, like a wireless ethernet device, a bluetooth device, or that sort could potentially manifest, but those devices, or their functionality within a larger unit could be fairly easily detected, requiring the passenger to disable the feature, or failing that, not use the equipment in flight.
Beyond that, if a Part 15 device is that big of a problem, perhaps the FCC should start testing things.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
there is no point in talking about car manufacturers because we are talking about airplanes. If a plane breaks, you fall out of the sky and die. If a car breaks, you are either late for work, or worst case you slide around on the ground, some airbags go off, and you are taken and treated at a hospital. People can't just walk away from a plane! Unless they want to start giving everyone a parachute, they better start making shit tougher! Making electronics this way is selfish and arrogant!
... since the earliest days of aviation radio navigation aids. AM and FM broadcast receivers have oscillators in them that can be tiny transmitters. Depending on design, they can interfere with the VOR, localizer, glideslope and ADF navigation receivers.. and only a few feet away from their antennas. Add in the intentional transmitters on cellphones, the digital radiation from laptops with wireless links accidentally turned on close to the GPS and DME frequencies and there's reason to be concerned.
Or is this just more of the same: "don't use your cell phone on the plane, use the convinient onboard phones we've installed, or the terrorists win (because it cuts into the bottom line)"?
If you do not fix the problem at the root, you leave yourself open to other, possibly larger, problems.
Let's face it, airplanes generally last 30 years or more before they are retired. Now, I don't put too much stock in a bunch of non-engineer pilots blaming random problems, but if there are problems with these on-board systems and electronic interferance, they need to be fixed, because electronic devices are not going to become less scarce.
We routinely hear stories on the biomedical front about how embedded electrical devices are solving problems that traditional medicine couldn't, or didn't solve well. Since the Jarvis heart, biomedical devices have bee cropping up at an increasing pace. I don't think you can ask the guy with a life-sustaining device embedded in his body to turn it off for the flight.
Add to this wearable computer technology, RFID tags everywhere, smart consumables, etc., and it is very possible that in 30 years it won't be possible to just tell people to turn their devices off. If there is a problem, fix it. If there isn't, stop scaring people.
"No overt attack neccesary; he would flip a switch, sit back and look forward to his 70 virgins that Allah[0] will be handing over in a few minutes while the crew futiley scramble around until the inevitable crash."
If we design our aircraft so poorly as to not have any manual controls, then some re-evaluation needs to occur. There's a reason that we have trained pilots that go through fairly extensive training on a particular aircraft (and are certified on only the particular plan/cockpit configuration that they fly regularly), is because they are supposed to be experts in what they do. If an electronics bug can cause a plane to fall from the sky, then the electronics have way too much control over the flaps, engines, rudder, and ailerons, and even if the computer is capable of making adjustments, the plane should still be manually controllable. I mean, what if lightning strikes a plane in the exact wrong place and it manages to cook the onboard computers?
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
I have a horrible impression that the use by passengers of high tech equipment is coincident with higher sophistication in the avionics and that software bugs are being misinterpreted by flight crew.
See my journal, I write things there
How could a device like a Spellchecker possibly emit enough RF to interfere with avionics dozens of feet away? If the avionics were really that sensitive then planes would be crashing every time solar activity increases or lighting strikes within miles of the plane.
An airport near here in Roanoke requires a landing approach that takes the plane very close to a couple mountains, the tops of which are literally covered with antenna blasting high power RF across the entire radio spectrum. Yet miraculously that doesn't interfere with the avionics.
Just because the problem went away about the same time the passenger turned off their spellchecker does not prove that was the problem.
What concerns me the most is that these hundreds of problems have been chalked up to consumer devices, when it could be legitimate problems internal to the avionics. If the are simply written off to external causes then the real problems will not be corrected.
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
Crude EM disruption devices are trival to build. It's one of the basic lessons in the Radio Shack Electronics sets they used to sell with springs and wires for each component in a fairly hardy box. Of course, the set used a relay to create a spark gap, then it just needed a little amplification. A spark gap would be unwieldy and make a lot of noise, but it's an easy leap to a solid state device.
Odd electronics should not be allowed as a carry on. They should go in a shielded luggage compartment, or be required to be in a shielded case to prevent such attempts.
Speaking of which, in 1996 when TWA800 went down I was going out of La Guardia the next morning. I figured it would be real fun, so I showed up hours early. I arrived to see three times the number of normal baggage handlers, and they all have shiney black shoes. There are "new" check in computers being manned by the shiney black shoe folks and it's taking over an hour to get "checked" in per person. They are really giving me a hassle, when all of a sudden a hand signal is given and the baggage handlers form a circle around a confused fellow holding a brief case. The biggest "baggage" handler says, "Drop the briefcase", followed by, "Sir, what is in the brief case?"
Then four of the handlers drop in a group and open the case and begin looking at it's contents. It's got four shiny cylinders, a lot of wiring attached to what appears to be a timer. The gentleman begins stammering. They baggage handlers repeat over and over, louder and louder, "SIR WHAT IS THIS THING!?".
As he continues to stammer, I lean over and say, "Sales pitch; make it a good one."
Something clicks in his addled brain and he begins to recite his canned pitch about plastic injection molds. I was relieved, as were several of the baggage handlers as he smoothly attempted to sell us plastic injection molds and controllers. He was led off quietly for further, "inspection".
That was a hair raising experience.
We yuppies are busy and important people. We most certainly WILL be meeting those contacts in our PDA's!
Whats with all the anti-yuppie sentiment anyways? Previous generations busted their asses to send their kids to college so they could become successful young people and when their kids end up actually succeeding they're instantly hated? What gives?
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
The reason the interference is not important: The Radio Navigation systems that are impacted by the intereference are no longer used to navigate and control the plane via autopilot. Although not entirely trusted by the FAA, the GPS is the guiding navigation system in most planes. GPS has no tranciever, and therefore is not affected by radio intereference
~ Maintainer of the Skajake Projects
Whether or not the laptop/plane connection is true I don't know but I'd feel less safe flying with a modern laptop than an older model, largely due to the presence of WiFi ports. My paranoia is better fueled by the apparent ability of a laptop to transmit/receive via wi-fi than by some field emitted by laptops that supposedly messes with flight controls.
Actually, it may not just be money and the aviation industry, I suspect there is also an issue with the herd "I've been told, but did not question" mentality too. I walked into a hospital reception recently while finishing off a mobile phone call, fully intending to switch it off while actually visiting. I was asked to finish my call outside by a nurse with a mobile phone clipped to her belt, it was switched on and presumably there to receive calls. When I raised this it transpired that it was "hospital issue and therefore OK", yeah, right, whatever...
OK, that's two points, but can you even have two cru... WTF is the plural of "crux" anyway, which I guess answers *that* question. ;)
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
On another occasion in 1996, a Boeing 767 pitched and dropped 120 metres before pilots recovered control. A passenger using an electronic dictionary was asked to turn it off, and the plane's systems returned to normal.
Although I'm sure that the liars would defend it by stating that they never said that the dictionary was -responsible- for the incident. But who's telling the lies here, and what is their motive? It must be at such a level that the people in charge of airline security know the truth, or they would not allow any electronic device of any kind onto a plane.
Is it all just an attempt to sell us their in-flight distractions so that we don't bring our own?
Has anyone masured the RF output of trivial devices such an an ipod or a digital camera? How about a laptop? Someone here must have a spectrum analyser..
The IEEE had a very interesting article in Spectrum magazine 7 years ago on the issue of portable electronics and flight safety. As megahertz/gigahertz ratings increase for computing devices, this should only get worse (maybe until it gets to the point where computing is beyond "normal" RF?)
The conclusion was that there is little doubt about the interference and it is not just cell phones. The article relates an incident when too many people listening to the radio (there was some "important" sports match going on) did cause noticeable interference. It seems that in most cases the pilot can notice that some instruments are providing inaccurate readings (thanks to having redundant information around, different instruments would be affected differently) and it doesn't become a big problem.
So, by using your high-frequency electronic devices inside the plane you're making the pilot's job more difficult. During cruise flight it may be less risky and during takeoff and landing it is definitely not recommended. Personally I wouldn't even trust that much those skyphones. I'd rather err on the safe side. Read a book!
How come passing cell phone towers, HAM, satelites (GPS, etc.), cosmic rays, (... etc. ...) and even the cockpit systems themselves don't cause interference to the cockpit systems?
There's a million sources of radiation anywhere there exists modern inhabitation. How come these immensely powerful sources of radiation do not interfere with the aircraft but my CD player with 2AA batters can? And if a tiny electronic device running on two tiny batteries can disrupt an aircraft, how can it possibly be safe to fly? Doesn't that constitute a violation of FCC regulations? (Yes, I meant FCC.)
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The most dangerous part of any flight is the takeoff and landing. If something were to go wrong they need the passengers ready to listen and react to instructions. My guess at the real intent is to remove potential distractions and entanglements (cords, dropped laptops, etc.) as much as possible.
When I pilot sees something weird with the instruments and blames it on a cell phone or PDA or something, that's really anecdotal. What I'd like to see is an interview with a cargo pilot. I mean, do pilots flying MD-11s for Fed Ex see these same little glitches? If so, I think it's safe to say it's not the passengers electronics causing the problems.
I read some theory about the actual plane itself (i.e being a long metal tube) not helping with interference. Busses and trains are also long metal tubes, you can use your gps unit, your mobile, your bluetooth and wi-fi notebook and your cd player all at once in bus, car, or train with out them interfering with each-other. I was always suspicious about airline electronics policies, i guess 10 years ago they were just being as safe as they could which is fine, but now days people really need to use their gadgets so its more in the airlines interests to find out exactly whats going on and try and fix it.
Maybe its because most airliners are quite old and the avionics engineers came up with strange and un-regulated ways of doing things eg "lets send the engine temperature in analog down unsheilded line multiplexed with all the other temperatures at various random frequencies" i could see why that would cause problems.
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This one always pissed me off, if it's such a danger then WHY TRUST people to be capable of turning off their devices. Most people can't manage their devices anyway, they are NOT IN control of their electronics. Not such a biggie now but later on with fuel cell powered ultra wide band gadgets...
As you can see here.
Civilian airplanes are built by the same people who build military planes, and they use the same shielded wiring systems, able to sustain the knocks of high-altitude cosmic radiation.
Even fly-by-wire Airbuses are highly unlikely to be knocked out by anything a hand-held device can generate.
The real reason why cellphones are banned in flight is to save ground networks from being spammed by phones zipping from cell to cell a hundred times faster than ever foreseen. Not to protect the plane from disaster.
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I prepose we wire up Cowboy Neal with all the cybernetics the Slashdot crew was talking about back on Slashdot radio years ago then use him as the test subject.
That is presumming the robotic legs don't put him over the weight limit.
I don't actually exist.
Uneasy, why? Flying in a plane is pretty much the safest way to travel. It is a LOT more dangerous to drive a car than it is to fly.
I'm a private pilot, and even on small planes we can have this problem. The problem does exist. It's not some pilot conspiracy to stop you from playing your Game Boy. Navigation is performed with the aid of a gyroscope and magnetic compass and VOR stations.(GPS is a few years away from becoming a standard). Any number of electronic devices can affect this system. In-cabin devices can have much more affect on these systems then outside incluences simply because you're basically travelling within an aluminum faraday cage. A microwave signal from a cellphone will bounce around inside the cockpit a lot more than if it is outside.
It is particularly crucial that these devices are off during landings. Landing is by far the most dificult portion of flying. On commercial planes, they are often making their approaches in IFR (Insturment) conditions. It takes very little to make approach devices go haywire. You don't want this happening when the visibility is 500ft and you are trying to touch down 30 tons of aircraft in fog. It hasn't happened yet, but sooner or later some aircraft is going to crash on landing because some schmoe couldn't wait till he got down safely to call and tell folks he is going to be late for his meeting. In 99 out of 100 cases there may be no effect on the plane, but it only takes one crucial event to destroy an aircraft. Try to remember that.
"Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect."- Steven Wright
It appears pilots are pretty much accustomed to handling weird problems with equipment, which they attribute to passengers' portable devices.
And in World War II, pilots used to blame weird problems on gremlins. Lets get real: Pilots, the vast majority of whom have no background in, or understanding of, electronics, are blaming portable electronic devices for interfering with their instrumentation. They provide nothing but anecdotal evidence to support these claims.
If there is a problem, it should be documented by the pilots and the airlines, the FAA should get involved, and electronic engineers should be paid to conduct an investigation. I'll be concerned when studies run by engineers and scientists show that such problems exist and are being caused by personal electronics. Is there commonality between instruments that fail (e.g., GPS units manufacture by Trimble, fly-by-wire systems in Airbus planes, etc.) or in portable devices that generate interference (e.g., Nokia 6000 series cell phones, HP Pavilion ZE4400 series notebooks, etc.)? These are the kind of questions that need to be answered.
Flying is unpleasant enough without further, possibly unnecessary, restrictions to make it even more so. After standing in line until their legs ache, passengers are practically strip-searched without probable cause. Unskilled, ignorant baggage screeners insist that people have laptop computers X-rayed. The screener manhandle cameras, laptops, and cell phones. People are crammed into undersized, uncomfortable seats. Every few years they are told to replace their carry-on luggage with something smaller because the airlines have crammed even more seats into the planes.
Why would you expect a 30 year old aircraft to be designed to filter out a particular RF frequency from a device that had not even been invented? Or some unknown combination of several devices, used in close proximity?
Why not shield the individual electronics first?
Case in point - radar detectors. They are supposed to be passive devices, merely sucking in the police radar, and warning the driver that he is being painted. But also, just as any other piece of electronics, they output a little RF on their own.
Detectors have been built, and sold to police departments, that can detect this particular frequency RF. From 50 feet away, in a car moving at 75mph. Radar detector detectors. Virginia uses them. Look up VG-2. The state troopers have this installed in their cars, and can tell if your radar detector is on as you pass him by. A $95 fine.
So the detector companies have been hardening their new models to mask this.
Again, why not shield the individual electronics? Get them tested. Market them as "Aircraft safe".
If making that phone call is sooo important, buy the slightly more expensive, tested and approved model.
The problem isn't with the aircraft designers. They are designing a complex system to safely transport people. They do shield everything in the sircraft. The problem is with poorly designed personal electronics designed by yahoos who think emissions are just some lame FCC rule they barely think about. The "fix" will not be from Boeing and Airbus. It's going to come from the FAA and FCC combined. They'll tighten up the restrictions on stray emissions, and then they'll probably make a list of devices that can not be allowed. The aircraft people make a very good product. If anything needs to be "fixed" it's the poorly designed products from the personal electronics industry. You can add 2 tons of useless shielding to an aircraft (which still won't quiet all the noise) or you can add a few ounces to each device. I'm in favor of the latter.
"Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect."- Steven Wright
Last I heard Airbus were using various RTOS systems and if its in a critical area, triplication with three different software solutions implemented on two different processor architectures (Motorola and Intel). I hope that Boeing is doing the same.
See my journal, I write things there
Note that the FMS has to be programed with the route for a flight. Programming these things, at least, used to be fairly painful with lots of horrible little codes and plenty of opportunity for keying errors. If you screw up, it is often easier to reset it.
See my journal, I write things there
I have no problem with you wanting to see scientific evidence. Until that time, you certainly won't mind if I continue to ask you to keep your devices off during takeoff and landings? You see, I want you to still be alive to see the results of that scientific research, and until I see evidence exonerating your devices, I would prefer you keep them off so I have one less thing to worry about while getting you to your destination. :)
"Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect."- Steven Wright
Gee, maybe someone should invent shielding for these wires and instruments. I mean, I know that's a difficult concept compared to everything else that goes into desighing an airplane...
Does Fedex's (or any other cargo carrier) fleet have the same problems? I'd seems reasonable that they would have the same cockpit instruments, but wouldn't have any passengers with equipment. So they should have almost zero problems with avionics, do they?
Isn't a radio pretty much an input-only device? In this case - with the exception of emissions from the audio-output portion of the device - would not any AM/FM signals be there regardless of wheter a radio is on or not... or does using said radio suddenly gather more signals to a given area. I'm going for the former, and while they may have *said* that radio emissions were causing the interfering, it was likely something else.
One of my good friends is a pilot for a major airline. He flies the transatlantic route to several points. Recently, we went to the Apple store near my home and he bought an iPod for him to be able to listen to his music on the flight.
I asked him if it would interfere at all with the electronics of the aircraft since it was a fly-by-wire. He said there would be no problem and that he routinely used his laptop in the cockpit without realizing the WiFi card was in and on...transmitting and receiving (nothing since no WAP was available). The reason he wanted the iPod was so he could leave the big bulky laptop packed away and have only the "deck of cards" sized music player to listen to his tunes.
He did note that his aircraft is fairly new and they were built with the thought of the possible interference and that if he were to be flying an old 737 from waaaaaaaaaaaaay back when, it was possible it might somehow interfere, but that cases like that were very rare. He said anything built since the late 70s should be able to handle the typical interference which might show up in the electronics.
Plant a tree in a developing country.
Maybe flight 93 didn't crash because the passengers fought the terrorists, it was the rest of the passengers using their cell phones.
But in reality, I have also been unable to find any scientific study about personal electronics and airline instruments / communications.
I would want to see the following questions answered: how I can use my "FCC home or office approved" device without causing any problems (the houses in my neighborhood are right up next to one another), but my iPod can somehow make an altimeter or compass screw up if I go a few kilometers above sea level? Are the airlines telling me that my Mac and neighbors' phones are better built than their jet cockpits?
Presuming that a laptop or cell phone can interfere with airplane cockpits, why can it not be detected from the cockpit? ("We've detected that personal electronics are on, and we won't take off until they're all off.") On the other hand, they cannot even detect a bomb in their luggage hold. If you cannot detect a signal from a gameboy, how can the device interfere with the plane?
It seems to me that it should be fairly simple (if not cheap) to find a correlation (or even cause-and-effect), then figure out a way to either enforce the ban, or shield the cabins and pass the cost onto the passengers.
Or, laptop makers could offer more expensive shielded models that will not be detected by, or interfere with, airplane instruments. Again, maybe some actual scientists could take a crack at proving this hypothesis first.
Now, let's talk about the unwillingness or airlines and governments to protect commercial planes against shoulder-launched missiles...
As a matter of fact, yes. I am a "let's say commercial airline pilot". I have flown Boeing (737, 757, 767, 777) and Airbus (A319 and A320), and Lockheed, and Beechcraft too. Sitting in the cockpit is a great place to witness the unusal occurrances in question. And I've not seen any (yet). I fly planes because I can't write software...
Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?
Consumer electronics devices are designed to be cheap. That means that they will not add shielding or EMI suppression unless someone holds a gun to their head.
A portable digital device can radiate large amounts of interference at many different frequencies. What is even worse, the RF output is not constant. Anything with a microprocessor in it will radiate at varying frequencies and power levels depending on what code the microprocessor is executing. This makes it almost impossible to test for interference to specific frequencies.
The earliest forms of computer music involved putting an AM radio near the computer and executing code snippets that would produce the desired sound (interference) on the radio.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
This is a PDF file of a study done by the CAA in the UK (equivalent to the FAA) on cellphone interference against instruments. It was done in a laboratory to model in-flight circumstances.
To quote from the report (6.1) :
The tests revealed various adverse effects on the equipment performance from simulated cellphone interference. Although the equipment demonstrated a satisfactory margin above the original certification criteria for interference susceptibility, that margin was not sufficient to protect against potential cellphone interference under worst case conditions.
So until there is concrete evidence one way or the other, erring on the side of caution may be advisable - its also one of the last places where you don't have to listen to some dickhead chatting on the phone in a loud voice.
Has anyone looked at the back of most consumer electronics lately?
Most electronic devices comply with part 15 of FCC regulations, meaning they don't cause
harmful interference and they have to accept all harmful interference. I know for certain that a
Game Boy would be hurt more by the plane than the plane would be hurt by the Game Boy
"No beer until you finish your tequila!" -Leela's Dad
Newscaster: "Fortunately, Dennis, flight 242 was struck in just the right place, giving a pleasing massage-like sensation to all aboard, and making the plane arrive in SFO a half-hour ahead of schedule. I'm Leslie Griffith. Back to you in the studio."
Hospitals have a tendency to ban cell phones too. One I went into cited a case where a cell phone interfered with a drip machine. That interference caused the machine to fail, killing the patient. When the patient and his belongings were removed, the machine returned to normal operation. No one could figure out why a perfectly functioning machine would fail, until someone brought the cell phone back into proximity with the machine, and it failed once more.
I would really like to think medical and aeronautical equipment can, and should be made to operate in the presence of RF, but until it is, we shouldn't force the airline companies to take risks. After all, many of these planes are more than 20 to 30 years old -- predating cell phones, laptops, and whatnot.
Christianity is a 3 element array making up a single entity.
God[0] - YHVH, God, Father, whatever
God[1] - Holy Spirit
God[2] - Jesus
and for catholics:
God[3] - Mother Mary
That isn't blasphemous. I'm sure a similar case could be made for the Allah array.
Let us say for the sake of argument that the various in flight systems on a current passenger airplane are so sensitive to interference from inside the cabin that all non intentional radiators must be shut down including laptops, radio receivers of any kind, etc. What does this say about the safety of the plane in question when confronted with the multitude of broadcast transmitters outside the fuselage that are covering the entire electromagnetic spectrum with thousands and tens of thousands of watts and various intermodulation products everywhere? Is the outside shielding of an aircraft really good enough to knock those outside transmitters down below the levels required by the FCC for unintentional radiators?
Although our concerns with security have changed since 9/11, the threat of someone deliberately jamming aircraft systems using an intentional radiator from inside the airplane has always existed. If current aircraft can not deal with FCC class B and part 15 electronics, there is no way they are going to deal with a deliberate attack never mind one that is specifically designed to interfere with aircraft navigation, communication, and operation.
I have worked on many projects as an electronics engineer where RF interference considerations from licensed transmitters were major issues as well as our own non intentional RF emissions. I used to be an avid amateur radio T-Hunter/Hider in Southern California and have seen first hand what powerful transmitters can do as well as the unintentional interference poorly shielded equipment can cause to excessively sensitive electronics.
I am skeptical about this. I work in a hospital with "Do not use wireless phones in this facility" signs on all the doors. Yet, when I asked our BioMed guy about this he said that in order to actually have even a slight chance of causing interference of medical devices, one would have to place their cell phone very close to said "affected" equipment... and, again, even then, he called it a slight chance to cause interference.
Not that I'd test this theory myself... not in the hospital, let alone on a plane.
I'm a pilot. I have a cell phone. I have it set to vibrate while flying, so I can see who called (I call them back later).
I've never seen interference with my instruments from this or any other cell phone activity.
Doesn't mean it can't happen. Just means I haven't seen it.
Oh, and by the way, we are all trained to handle such interference interruptions, and it's really no big deal when/if they happen. The instruments that you really need for critical situations (i.e. final approach and landing in fog, by instruments) are fairly inured to electronic failure (barring loss of electricity).
Ten incidents per year (I wonder what percentage of Aussie flights that comprises) "all due to portable devices"... the article does NOT go on to detail that claim. It cites an anecdote in which one plane's systems are alleged to have come back online after a passenger turned off a device, then goes on to say that "on more than one occasion, laptop computers have been blamed for changing an aircraft's internal cabin pressure."
The incidents, logged in an Australian Transport Safety Bureau database, have been collated for the first time and detailed in the latest edition of Flight Safety Australia, published by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority."
Because the article authors didn't bother to include a link to the article, I'll assume that this is the one they're referring to. If so, this article does not in any way "collate" (collect) or "detail" them. It's a single-page article which is pretty much as insubstantive as its referer. It mentions a few anecdotes, then states:
So they hit the equipment with waves, but what was the result? They forgot to mention specifics, such as "the equipment behaved unexpectedly". The paragraph trails off with the statement that "the risk of interference is then at its greatest".
Next time you're on a flight and the plane suddenly begins to climb or pitch to the left, it's probably just the kid next to you conquering level 16 on his computer game.
Or it might be the wind and/or the captain trying to navigate the plane to its destination.
Laurie Cox, a spokesman for the Australian Federation of Air Pilots, said more research was needed into the effect of electronic devices.
Bingo.
"You've got to ask, do you want to get there, or do you want to use your laptop?"
No, I don't have to ask that. I've been "getting there" for years, while surrounded by people who use electronics.
I'm not saying electronics don't cause interference. What I'm saying is that as yet there is no basis for concluding that they do cause interference, and because such evidence would not be difficult to produce I think passengers are owed more by the airline industry and FAA than having to rely on these panic puff-piece articles that come along to garner readership by stirring the shit with unsubstantiated claims. If the airline industry or any regulatory body cared about passenger safety, they'd do a real study. Failing that, the next best thing would be for the airlines to err on the side of caution and say "we don't know if electronics do or don't cause interference, so we're banning them to be safe"; at least that would be a
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
To avoid the Aryan heresy, you should really have
God[0] - God, YHVH, Allah, whatever
God[1] - Father - pointer to God[0]
God[2] - Holy spirit - pointer to God[0]
God[3] - Jesus - pointer to God[0]
That way it's a bit less blasphemous. To keep the inquisitors happy, you'd probably be better off inheriting Father, Son and Holy Spirit from an abstract GOD base class.
With all properties strictly read-only I suspect. And whatever happens, don't ask awkward questions about the ctor() on the GOD class...
TomV
AFAIK, Arabic did not exist as a language at the time of Mohammed. The prophet spoke Syraic.
The original Koran would have been recorded in the language of the prophet (in the legendary haphazard order). The Arabic Koran is a translation of this original document. AFAIK, the original Koran was lost. I could be wrong, of course.
The problem confronting the Koran in this context is the same as is faced by the readers of the Gospel of Thomas - the only extant version is in Coptic, which was a translation from Greek. Can an English translation be faithful to the original Greek? Christianity and Judism are both well acquainted with the perils of (mis)translation.
I read the Dawood translation of the Koran some years ago. The points made by Luxenberg, especially regarding the chilled versus boiling water, seem to be much more reasonable than what I saw printed. I would love to read an English translation of the German text.
Jay J. Ely and team are pretty much the leaders in tearms of research in this area, as the NASA Langley Technical Reports Server shows.
You can get actual reports of incidents related to PEDs and aircraft events at The National Aviation Safety Data Analysis Center .
Also in Oct 2002, at the Digital Avionics Systems Conference in Irvine, CA, Session E addressed this topic:
Session E - The Electromagnetic Environment
Co-Chairs - Paul Cox, Honeywell Defense Avionics Systems Bill Larsen, Federal Aviation Administration
Holland
what's blasphemous though is your use of a capital letter at the start of a variable name! ;-)
if (!signature) { throw std::runtime_error("No sig!"); }
I hate to respond to a troll, but I feel in this case, I must.
If you had any idea of the protocol in the cockpit, you wouldn't have posted such an obviously under-informed opinion. I can see how, if he were the only person in the cockpit, it would be a problem. However, except during take off and landing, there is basically one person doing everything...that person is the autopilot. Then, there's one person monitoring. They take turns. It's really not that difficult to figure out, is it?
How exactly would you recommend the people in the cockpit "improve passenger safety and service"? They're operating under the guidelines of the aviation industry and applicable governments. Safety isn't going to be a problem I'd hope. After all, _most_ pilots are responsible people. Did you think he was listening to Britney WHILE he was actually piloting the plane? Unless there up there doing crystal meth, I don't expect they'd do anything which might endanger the passengers or their jobs. As for service, they're flying the plane. What else do you want from the cockpit crew? Blow jobs?
Personally, I'm really not that dim. Most would consider me bright. However, I have left my wifi card running, packed the laptop away (after putting it to sleep), and then opened it at my destination (or before) to no signal. This really is not an unusual event. I see people doing it all the time. Fairly smart people who didn't realize they could turn off their card do it just about every day.
As far as the pilots of the hijacked aircraft on 9-11, I think the consensus was that they were engaged in a circle jerk. Nothing like getting caught with your pants down, eh?
Please don't troll like that...and anonymously to boot. If you're going to be a troll, at least let your identity be known.
Plant a tree in a developing country.
How about banning cellphones laptops and games just in case you have a marketing partnership for in-flight communications/entertainment/advertising services? Nothing like a captive audience to drum up advertising bucks for those poor ailing airline companies!
If planes went haywire during sunspots and solar flares the FAA would require them to be properly shielded or use fiber optics or something. Why not demand that they use fiber optics for flight-systems instead of antiquated and vulnerable electrical signalling equipment?
As for the navigation equipment: never get stuck with data from one piece/kind of navigation equipment. Your autopilot should use directional beacons and GPS and inertial guidance data to crosscheck wherever it estimates a reading. There are hundreds of lives at stake if there is *any* reason to sound an alarm. This cannot and should not be left to the discretion of passengers. If there is a problem nip it in the bud, and make the aircraft resistant to that kind of noise! There is no other acceptable solution.
If you can really wreak all that havoc with a small electronic device, then why would a terrorist need to smuggle a bomb onto a plane? Anyone could crash the plane with a handful of batteries, some tape, and wire. Good-old spark-gap ultrawideband transmitter should affect just about everything! Wait until the right moment and *sparkety* *sparkety* *sparkety* *spark* *spark* *spark*!
Honestly, my bullshit detector is pegged here. It has all the likley factors: false inferences, ulterior motives, good reasons support an opposite inference. If there isn't enough controversy to support real science IT IS BULLSHIT!
--- Nothing clever here: move along now...