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The Real Reasons Phones Are Kept Off Planes
jcatcw writes "Mike Elgan argues that the the real reason that cell phones calls are not allowed is fear of crowd control problems if calls are allowed during flight. Also, the airlines like keeping passengers ignorant about ground conditions. The two public reasons, interference with other systems, could easily be tested, but neither the FAA nor the FCC manage to do such testing."
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?co
Now, from FTA:
Yes, PH3AR teh information! Teh interweb must also be teh BANNED!!! What would happen if we let people view things like THIS on their cellphones?
But the "What's wrong with the ban?" section is lame too:
If we use cellphones, then TEH TERRORISTS HAVE WON!!!!11!!eleven!!
At least we still have Mocha
this is funny because he missed the obvious and actual reason. most planes ive flown on have had a phone on the arm rest with a little slot to swipe your credit card.
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
that's what airphones are for!
RTFA. They realize that they would have passengers yapping loudly through entire flights oblivious to their neighbors who are getting ready to chuck them overboard? They rightly do not want their people in the middle of that.
The one benefit I can think of is that the airlines then must make a "quiet zone", with no phones, no loud talkers, and NO CRYING BABIES!
There are already enough planes that have satellite television (including news channels) along with air phones (at a very high cost - yes but still a source of information.
The real reason? Its bad enough when people are yapping on their phones constantly on the ground. Getting stuck on a plane near someone who won't shut up on the phone is MUCH MUCH worse due to the duration and the captive audience. For that reason I hope cell phones are never allowed (and if they are it should be a cell phone only section kept reasonable sound proof from the rest of the plane).
'Nuff said.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Who wrote this article?! Of course the FAA and FCC tested it. And so did the Mythbusters on a recent show. They proved if you hold the cell phone close enough, the radiation if gives off can affect equipment that would definitely result in a plane crash. It's horribly unlikely that a cell phone way back in the passenger area would affect the equipment but it's still possible, which makes it about as good of an idea as when the gas station near me had an open grill brat fry about 15 feet from the pumps. Yeah it's probably far enough away but do you really want to risk it? Same thing on planes so stop complaining.
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
It annoys me often enough to hear people always talking loudly to their cell phones when I sit in a bus or in a tram. Constant talking in an airplane would be a much bigger pain in the arse.
Conservatism: The fear that somewhere, somehow, someone you think is your inferior is being treated as your equal.
It might be easy in theory, but you need to think of scale. Take all of the cellphone manufacturers, during the course of a year a lot of cellphones are released. So each year you have a lot of cellphones to test. Then, the test itself isn't so clear-cut. Sure, that 1-year-old 737 might run fine, but what about the 7-year-old 737? It might have less around the electronics, or casual wear-and-tear might have left an opening. Put both factors together, and testing isn't so easy. Sure, it's possible but is it really worth the effort?
Lots of empty arguments, lots of ads. Holy siamese twins Batman, do you think there could be a connection?
I hate printers.
I actually largely agree with airlines, but why not just *say* that's the reason? It's like we have to be super-sensitive and never shatter Miss Chatterbox's worldview that she isn't a pain in the ass to everyone else. I'd bet most people would agree with such a ban, too.
But why does it even have to come to a ban? Can't you just have "cell phone OK" parts of the plane and let them suffer with each other?
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
If they mean controlling what happens on the plane when several people get fed up with the babble of the idiot next to them and shove his phone up his ass, then this might be valid.
Fifteen years ago if you saw someone with a cell phone you knew it was a Doctor or someone with equally important reason to be "on-call". Today you know they are just another servant on a leash!
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
People have been living without phones on planes for this long, might as well continue.
I really dont want to have to deal with other peoples conversations all flight long.
The only thing that could make my flights even more stressful than they already are (babies screaming, kids behind me hitting my seat, the person in front of me immediately putting their seat back, giving me no room to lean forward, etc...) would be someone sitting next to me, who does not apparently have the ability to control the volume of their voice, chatting away for the full 2 hours while I try to sleep. And to make matters worse, they'll probably be eating at the same time.
I'd be ok with the cellphone/no cellphone section division, though. That would be cool. Or maybe a special room for people talking on the phone. That way, I could use it without bothering anyone else if I absolutely have to make a call.
If gadgets can't crash planes, then the ban is costing billions of hours per year of lost productivity by business people who want to work in flight.
Millions of man hours in playing solitaire/minesweeper is costing billions per year in lost productivity and taxes for the government. I say that the FAA and FCC get together and put a ban on these, especially while in flight.
They tested this on Mythbusters and had difficulty getting phones to interfere even in contrived scenarios such as at point blank range, with very old navigation equipment.
I've never heard of any incident where navigation equipment was actually affected by a cell phone in the real world. Wouldn't you think if it were even possible, it would have happened at least once?
Recently I was on a flight where this chick yacked on some business call for almost 30 minutes while we were waiting to back out from the gate. I wish assholes wouldn't use cell phones on the airplane, same as in restaurants or movies. It sucks, but why do we need this BS excuse about interference?
Bingo!
however:
you know, I'd rather the government (of whichever country) err on the side of caution, actually: "Well, we can't tell whether cellphones might cause crashes, so we'll just allow them and see what happens"?
Bottom line for me: people are annoying with cellphones. Now imagine sitting next to the guy talking shite for all 12 hours of a long haul flight. I'd hijack the plane just to shut him up. Keep the ban, people can surely live without cellphones for the duration of a flight... surely?
If gadgets can't crash planes, then the ban is costing billions of hours per year of lost productivity by business people who want to work in flight.
What the author completely fails to address is the noise that ensues if you have ten businesspeople in first class all "doing business" on a cell phone at the same time. Are they supposed to wander the aisles and pace as they talk? Or merely talk over one another in increasingly loud voices?
There's something about a long tube that seems to suggest to people that maybe conversation should be kept to a minimum. Not only planes, but buses and subways and trains too. In my experience riding public transit, most people do not chatter on their phones endlessly. In part, I think, because there's an unconscious realization that the guy standing 6 inches away (that you can't move away from) does not want or need to hear your prattle.
Tell her to see a doctor. She may have contracted an STI. Try to be tactful (don't say "rotten meat"), but do get the message across, because an STI might leave her with long-term health problems such as infertility.
You should get yourself checked out too. You might be the source of the infection.
Slashdot - health advice for nerds.
I was always under the impression that a mobile phone travelling at 500+ mph on a plane would be hopping from network cell to cell fairly regularly (once every few seconds?). This sort of frequent handover would then a) make it difficult to make, receive and conduct a call and b) cause issues for the phone networks if you've got num_people_per_plane * num_planes_in_sky_over_country people's phones all doing the same hops fairly regularly. Meh.
There is nothing interesting going on at my blog
How is someone talking on a cell phone any more annoying than the typical drunk vacationers yelling across the rows to their buddies? Or the surly teen with his music cranked up so loud I can hear the lyrics from outside his headphones?
From TFA:
The airlines fear "crowd control" problems if cell phones are allowed in flights. They believe cell phone calls might promote rude behavior and conflict between passengers, which flight attendants would have to deal with. The airlines also benefit in general from passengers remaining ignorant about what's happening on the ground during flights, including personal problems, terrorist attacks, plane crashes and other information that might upset passengers.
Please explain the existence of "AirFones" if this is true?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
With no players anymore in the US, Verizon out and aircell now offering Wifi instead of phone calls, this is not a reason.
Also the only phones still avaliable on planes are run by ARINC and SITA, which both now have a picocell replacements under testing for installation this year.
There is no technical nor marketing reason you can't have a cell phone on board, if cell phones were a real danger then they would not be in carry on allowance anymore.
FAA is very conservative, and the FCC is a political body.
That is all
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
too many DIGG links.....
wtf?
To those that are agreeing or suggesting a dedicated section of the plane for phone talkers -- including TFA -- I suggest this: Next time you're on a plane, ask somebody on the other end of the plane from you to simulate talking on their cell. You'll hear it anywhere in the plane. Now imagine a whole section of people talking, perhaps even gesturing wildly! Oh the humanity...
Basically the entire article is "They could do this... but the ban is cheaper." Of course! We're talking about corporations here! I know the FCC and FAA would love to spend taxpayer monies to study the issue, though. I think the article's author is just bitter he can't use his Crackberry while on a plane.
I say keep the ban in place, but be honest about the fact that people who will talk on their phone all the damn time are annoying. I have to deal with all kinds of people on their phones at work in public. Be honest with yourself, people. You talk loud when you're on a cell phone. I don't want that in an airplane. Noise canceling headphones only go so far.
There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
This is a technical reason for a regulatory body to ban a technology? ... I hate the stupid people on the internet and so I think the internet should be banned too!
Next
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
Ok so you tell someone not to make a phone call to it doesnt jack with the plane system. You ask people to turn there phones off for the same reason. But who is to say that everyone turnes there phone off? Just because your phone is not making a call doesn't mean it isn't sending out information.
I still get that buzzing sound from my PC speakers when i'm not on the phone.
The greatest revenge in life is massive success.
'Smore said?
It's worse than just the combinations of phones and planes. An aircraft makes a nice enclosed resonant space for cell signals to bounce around inside. Anyone who has looked at simulating or measuring RF fields would know that the field strength can vary by orders of magnitude depending on the exact location, orientation, and frequencies of the emitter and the exact orientation and location of the susceptible wiring or instrument. A tall person sitting in seat 6B with a CDMA phone may cause no problems, but a short person with a GSM phone in seat 32F could interfere with the automatic landing system. The field strength won't necessarily drop with distance inside the plane and may be focused to high levels anywhere inside the aluminum tube.
And testing individual phones isn't sufficient. What happens when 100 people all use their phones at the same time.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
At least based on this site, there is absolutely no GSM reception above 650m (2100ft). So I guess the plane would need an own GSM base station for the cell phones to work.
Sure, we could solve the problem if we completely redesigned, modified and tested every susceptible aircraft and cellular network on the planet. That wouldn't cost much money.
Anyone who uses the results of an episode of Mythbusters as proof of anything deserves to be ridiculed.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The two public reasons, interference with other systems, could easily be tested, but neither the FAA nor the FCC manage to do such testing.
Actually, there was an article in IEEE Spectrum about a year ago on interference testing in planes: "Unsafe at any airspeed?". They were measuring what's currently happening when people disobey rules (or just use devices that behave strangely). I don't remember the details, but I remember that the conclusion was along the lines of "this looks a bit scary and you definitely don't want to allow cell phones in planes without doing at least a lot more careful studies". Also, their guesstimate (based on frequency of interference-related incidents and typical accident-to-incidents ratios) was that cell phones (and other electronic devices) might have contributed to about one major accident (expected value) every 12 years. That with the current "ban" (that some people ignore).
Opus: the Swiss army knife of audio codec
I manage to work on almost every business flight I take. Mostly by collecting and printing stuff that i need to read and learn, or by sitting with a notebook brainstorming technical problems. Occassionally (if i have a decent amount of leg room) then i'll pull out the laptop and do some actual coding.
It takes a little planning to find something to do but it's really not hard to make semi-productive use of that time.
Sheesh. The article reads a little like a tinfoil hat conspiracy. I really don't care what reason they choose to tell me for keeping wireless phones off planes. I'm just glad they do. Hearing 1/2 of 75 outdoor voice conversations in a cramped human cargo compartment for an hour and a half would be unbearable. Now, if they can apply the same reasoning from the article ("They believe cell phone calls might promote rude behavior and conflict between passengers, which flight attendants would have to deal with.") to restaurants and movie theaters, I'd be one happy camper.
Mike Elgan, the article's author brushes off the problem of an airborne cell phone seeing a large number of cell towers at once. He claims it could be easy to fix with a software upgrade to the towers. Nonsense. The fundamental problem is that there is only a finite range of frequencies for cell phone calls. The more towers a given phone's signal is visible to, the more towers whose frequencies you're chewing up. Redesigning the system to support cell calls would be massively expensive. Is the value of being able to make cell calls from a plane really that valuable? Who is going to pay for the overhaul? Elgan is just whining.
Elgan points out that Europe is working on making this work. Tellingly, they're not just letting the phones connect to towers normally; they're shielding the cabin and routing connections through dedicated on-plane hardware. This is reasonable as it means you have a single source (the plane's hardware) that can far more efficiently utilize tower frequency space. Furthermore, the cost of making the changes falls on the airlines, who will pass it on to the logical people: the fliers who want to use this service.
Search 2010 Gen Con events
My 0.02 as an air carrier pilot... I've seen 3 actual instances of interference from not just cell phones,
but also data cards. 2 were voice bleed over when the persons cell phone was transmitting in analog mode, and the other was an AHRS (attitude and heading reference system...VERY important) which took a dump when someone started using their data card..fortunately it was good weather and the AC had an iron gyro backup system. Filed NASA ASRS reports on each. I certainly wouldn't use "Mythbusters" as any source of certification data.
You have to understand that in the avionics can be located anywhere in the plane, not just upfront. On top of that the FAA is VERY picky about figuring out the worst case and applying it to all situations. If a person is in back using an old analog brick phone on a older aircraft, say a 727 or DC-9, and there is the even a remote chance of interference, everything will be prohibited, because how in the world are you going to police every make and model of phone with all the variations of aircraft?
The NTSB files are chock full of accidents that happened because something happened that someone said couldn't, so I'm perfectly happy with the ban. If it keeps them from chatting loudly in my ear as I try to commute home, well that's just a bonus.
So they should be banning carry on cell phone, not use on board?
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
Just deflate her and throw her away. Get a new one. Blow up dolls are not expensive.
Do these things where I am not forced to participate. We do not need closed quarters to be any more uncomfortable. What I would support is for a stewardess to keep one phone of some kind that is known not to compromise the onboard system. Either passengers or people on the ground can use this phone, with stewardess'es approval, to relay emergency or other essential messages.
When people figure out how bad service is at cruising altitudes, they will start to question how all of those nice clear calls were made from those hijacked planes.
See here Project Achilles' Report
Transporter_ii
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
It's teh aliens!
They don't want anyone to find out they eat people's brains while on the plane and replace them with evil clones!
Next time you're thinking of flying somewhere, try walking instead, it might just save your delicious delicious brainses!
The last thing I need to spend five hours (plus or minus two while waiting on the runway) listening to the girl next to me talk to her boyfriend, the guy sitting behind me working out a business deal and the old man across the aisle constantly yelling for all the young spoiled brats to shut up.
Because being subjected to that travesty of a Rocky movie, crying babies, and airline food isn't bad enough already...
1. The Washington Post to give my story.
2. 911 to get help.
The only thing new in this world is the history that you don't know.[Harry Truman]
They just don't want you yappin' in everyones ear. Theres enough damn annoyances in the world without another.
Yeah, I'd love to use my phone, etc. on the plane but with the interference it causes to my car radio I'd rather avoid the pilots having to deal with that. Shoot, I almost got kicked off a bus in Seattle once because it was interfering with the intercom and I didn't even know it until I found out it was downloading a podcast automatically. Had to turn it off & apologize profusely.
the airlines make a fortune with their own phones, you know, the one where you have to use your credit card. If they allow passengers to use their own phone, the airlines would lose their profit on phones. That is also why they have been fighting voip too.
With no players anymore in the US, At&T and (GTE) Verizon out and aircell now offering Wifi instead of phone calls, this is not an option reason.
Also the only phones still avaliable on international planes are run by ARINC and SITA, which both now have a GSM ( cell phone ) picocell installation under testing for installation this year.
There is no technical nor marketing reason you can't have a cell phone on board, if cell phones were a real danger then they would not be in carry on allowance anymore.
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
Planes would be dropping out of the sky left and right. Cell phone radiation is miniscule compared to all the other RF in the air any time. Methinks perhaps joe mythbusters got a friendly bit of "scientific advice" from some scary looking guys in dark suits before they ran that episode.
I posted this to the original article as well, but I felt the slashdot community might derive some value from it as well. The interference issue is a VERY real one. I can't emphasize this enough. It's easy to debate this issue on the ground, but try debating it 2 miles above the ground when your only lifeline is a thin needle on a panel that is controlled by a radio transmitter on the ground. I have a personal experience with cellphone nav interaction. I've also watched the mythbusters episode. Everyone here knows that mythbusters, while entertaining, is not entirely scientific. I certainly am not willing to stake my life on the thoroughness of their conclusions.
Without further prefacing, here is my original post:
You mention in your article that "Many headsets used by private pilots come with jacks for using them with cell phones. The manufacturers say they're for use on the ground only. But many private pilots use them in the air without incident."
I fall into this category. However, I've also seen the dangers of airborne cell phone use. I carry a Nextel branded Blackberry. From my experience, it's not a very good phone to use on board an aircraft. About every 20 minutes or so, the phone goes into a signal frenzy. It's as if it finds multiple strong towers to connect to and is unable to choose. This results in a barrage of beeps and lights while it tries to figure out what's going on.
Furthermore, the risks of interference are very real. When I'm using the phone, I never notice the interference. I recently let someone else use my phone and was very surprised. My headset (flight radio headset) emitted a horrible scratching noise. I was totally unable to hear anything on the radio. I quickly looked at my VOR (radio navigation, NOT a gps) , and noticed that it was off coarse as well. Now, had I not been certain that I was on the right course, I might have well thought I was off course and corrected in an ultimately wrong direction.
I'm not sure if you're familiar with VOR technology, but it's the primary aviation navigational aid. GPS is wonderful, but it's still not the primary navigation mechanism. GPS is considered a "non-precision" navigation tool. VOR and ILS are still the primary mechanisms and they are dependent upon terrestrial radio transmissions. This is where the cellphone interference comes into play. Most cell phones operate in the 800mhz range. I'll save you a lesson in radio technology by simply stating that they can often have harmonic emissions in the same bands as used for aircraft navigation.
While you state that countless numbers of phones are left on during flights, this is not particularly dangerous. A phone ranging a tower is only actively transmitting for a very short period of time every 20 minutes or so at regular speeds. A phone that is in active use is a source of radio emissions that is in VERY close proximity to the aircraft communications and navigation antennas and is operating on a frequency that can have interfering harmonics. I have personal experience with the reactions a nav needle can have to a cellphone.
Imagine if the weather was bad (instrument meteorological conditions or IMC) and you were trying to land a large passenger airliner using nothing but a small needle on the panel to align with the runway. Then, a passenger starts talking to their uncle Bill about his bypass surgery and that needle jumps even 10 degrees off position. Now, instead of aligning with a runway, you're aligning with a corn field.
To answer your thoughts about shielding, that's not a viable solution. You would either have to shield the passenger cabin from radio emissions or shield the comm/nav antennas from it. In either case, the shielding to protect them from each other would seriously impair their usefulness. A passenger cabin shielded from RF emissions wouldn't allow your cell signal to get out, thereby negating the purpose. Shielding the comm/nav antennas sounds like a good idea until you realize that oftentimes nav aids and aircraft controllers a
They started making them in 68! I wouldn't be too surprised if the old models used analog signaling (much more susceptible to noise than digital stuff). Anyway for people who don't believe that cellphones are noisy, there's a simple test - just place call with a GSM phone near a radio...
The Raven
From the IEEE's Spectrum magazine last year, they actually measured RF signals on flights and reported on the results. No smoking gun where an accident was caused by a cell phone, but still interesting nonetheless (and no ads!). http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/mar06/3069
My father is a retired Pilot (Air Force, then the American Airlines). Since I used to work for Jeppesen, we have had some interesting conversations about this. He has said that he has seen nav equipment messed with that the FAA said was cell phones. Now it was early 90's, and likely to be one of the analog phone, but they were not certain. But some of his old co-pilots (now all senior captains for American), says that several instruments will be interfered with from time to time and they believe it to be cell phone. In general, they claim that most of the interference occurs on the ground (i.e. as soon as the phones are turned on). Now, I do not know why that is, but I would want to make certain before allowing them to be used. It is possible that it is just one frequency or type of phone that is causing the issue. My question is, why has the FAA not determined where the issue is? ALPA is actively pushing against allowing the phone usage until FAA or FCC can explain what is causing this.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
From cnn.com:
...And cell phones sometimes have trouble working when the plane is at cruising altitude because phone towers aren't built to project their signals that high.
Source
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't they have to come up with what amounts to an onboard cell site/repeater to make the cell phones work from a flying airplane?
Transporter_ii
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
Take out your phone. Look at person you is bothering you. Pretend to speak into the phone, "Hello? Hello? Hello? Hello? Hello?" They will soon run away if they can.
Atleast he didn't quote some made up fact of "Billions of dollars of lost productivity".
I ride the train to work every day, it's an above ground train so you can use your cell phone. I realized that the one thing I hate most is the invention of cell headsets. either the little cable that comes with the phone (which hangs down by your chest) or the tiny bluetooth headsets. Either way, people think they need to yell to be heard. I can't imagine sitting on a flight to Tokyo in the middle section with a few people around you all yelling into their bluetooth headsets to be heard above the drone of the engines and the other people on flight.
While on the train I can get up and move to a different seat or stand by the door. On an airplane I'm forced to sit next to this moron yelling in whatever language he is fluent in. I think i could make billions selling a 'bluetooth' jammer http://www.ladyada.net/make/wavebubble/index.html right before you get on the flight.
What about WIFI? That's all I need some jerkoff, connecting to the internet, firing up Vonage/VOIP and then either a) using speakerphone and built in mic, OR b) Using a f-ing bluetooth headset. Also on the subject of wifi, that's all i need, I pay $10 (or whatever) and then get almost NO bandwidth as everyone has to fireup a VPN and connect to their Exchange servers. Also, if I pay $1000 for a first class ticket, do I get better wireless? Or a AP for ONLY first class passengers? Surely, if there are 20ppl in first class, I don't want to have to share it with the 200 cattle in the back.
Then we need a ban on carry on for cell phones, laptops etc...
... This is more a factor.
FAA is conservative, FCC is a political
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
Until they develop a mental-telepathy interface for cellphones, I'm just fine with this.
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
The TV show MythBusters "busted" as a myth the conventional wisdom that phones interfere with avionics.
The Mythbusters also constructed a fake airplane cabin and dropped themselves 10-20 feet onto solid ground to see which crash positions were safest. In the episodes I watched, they routinely ignore or arbitrarily (and grossly) weight evidence. It is psuedo-science at its finest: a moderate amount of science, and then simplified experiments without enough controls, that throw the whole "experiment" out the window. They're a bunch of special effects guys, with a couple of actors for assistance, on a TV show, for chrissakes.
It's not as simple as "flip on a laptop in the cabin, see if anything wonky happens." Mythbuster's idea of a "scientific" investigation would be to buy 10 laptops and try it in 2 planes, a jet, and a helicopter. It's "shotgun" science.
When I was young, my father was a commercial-license pilot (not "commercial" in money-making sense or letting you fly jumbos- it's the class of license) and we'd fly places on a semi-regular basis. We'd occasionally take along a laptop for looking at weather charts, planning the IFR flight, etc.
This was in the day of VHF/UHF beacons, used for direction-finding. They're still used, but back then, even LORAN units were kind of an unusual luxury, and most often used as a backup or confirmation of your primary instrumentation. You'd plan the flight following beacons, with cross-checks every so often to make sure you're where you think you are AND that everything is working properly. If it's a nice day out, you look for a tower or some other landmark and do a visual.
The issue, as he explained it, was this: what if the laptop makes the direction-finder off by a bit? Suddenly you're not where you thought you would be, and the laptop didn't give you any extra fuel, and the laptop didn't tell ATC that you were going off on a field trip from your flight plan, and the laptop didn't move that mountain or radio tower out of the way.
A lot of these are solveable problems, but pilots and scuba divers (particularly technical/cave/wreck divers) will tell you that big problems start from little ones. It's a snowball effect, and often just being distracted by a minor problem is enough to cause another minor problem to go unnoticed, until it becomes a BIG problem.
Please help metamoderate.
Is the cel phone ban universal and universally enforced, or are there countries with airlines that allow people to use cel phones now?
For instance, as recently as five years ago Aeroflot allowed smoking on board Trans-atlantic flights.
Surely one airline somewhere doesn't stop cel phone use, and would offer some actual insight into the question.
Three Squirrels
I swear I'd kill the person receiving a phone call on an overnight flight when I'm trying to sleep. Their stupid ringtone with the theme music from some chavvy television programme echoing through the plane, their frantic rustles to find the phone (if they wake up), their phone would have volume increase enabled for the ring tone, so after 5 seconds it sounds like a klaxon. Yes. Murder.
I'm sure I'm not the only one who would think this way.
In light of this, banning mobile phones is a sensible option, and it is easier to make it a blanket ban rather than having a 'turn mobiles off' sign next to the 'fasten seatbelt' sign.
Anyway, it's nice to not have to deal with the outside world for some time. Nice to be separated, read a book, listen to some music, chat, etc. Not being on call like some kind of modern day slave to the system.
We should be focusing our efforts on keeping snakes off of planes. Phones can often be useful- for asking snake experts about various types of venom- and sending them cell phone pictures.
This is pretty basic stuff, people.
A couple of years ago I was stuck on a flight from Heathrow to Bombay - we'd already been delayed a couple of hours thanks to fog. Through the entire flight I sat behind a kid who was a complete spoilt brat. He was probably around 10, constantly playing his nintendo with the sound on for the first few hours. I told around and asked his mom to get him to turn the damn things sound off which eventually got him bored. A little later the kid decided it'd be fun to bang on the tray table on the back of my seat. Wake up turn around again, tell her to keep him under control. Shes very apologetic but basically has no idea how to control the brat other than buying him crap to play with (this was virtually all their hand luggage). He decided to run up and down the isle making crashing sounds. When the stewardess asked his mum to keep him under control she just bust out wailing followed quickly by him. He had the whole cabin of a 747-400 up.
They got him chocolates which shut up him up for a couple of hours but it started and basically went on until we landed. Now I've no sympathy for moms like that in general - if you can't manage them don't have them seriously. Once we landed she whips out her cell and calls I think everyone in her contact list to tell them that we just landed and ask what they were upto. We take forever to taxi and we are waiting to get off the damn plane. She is still on the cellphone behind me yakking in my bloody ear. I'd gotten maybe 2 hours of sleep that entire flight in 10-15 min intervals. I swear there was a second just before we got of the plane that all I could think about was sashing her face in and stuffing the cellphone down her stupid throat. We got back ok and nobody died but I'm sure sure a lot of you have been in similar situations and it scares me in hindsight how close that was to just snapping.
Crowd control is exactly the problem with cellphones on flights and if they are allowed sooner or later(probably sooner) someone is going to get their neck broken. I'm not sure they'd really be guilty either. Obviously its unreasonable and if we need to not listen we can just use ear plugs and let you have your freedom of speech. Too bad something being unreasonable does not stop it from happening. TFA argues that that cellphones are a benefit to people and businesses. So is peace of mind, sanity and sleep when we are all in a cramped metal box, 32,000 ft above sea level.
Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.
I don't understand. I thought that the plane that was "taken back by the passengers" during 9/11 they were using their cell phones to find out out the terrorist attacks. In fact, isn't that where the "Let's Roll!" mantra was supposedly heard from, one of the guys leaving a message with his girlfriend via cell phone?
I've always been highly annoyed that many airlines choose to ban GPS on board planes. These are devices that are only receivers, not emitters of signals, and should cause no interference with anything. Usually this falls under the banner of "we do not allow any electronic devices to be used which transmit or receive a signal", but I've heard them specifically call out GPS devices as being banned on at least one flight I've flown on. There's just no good reason, as far as I can tell, for doing this, but when I asked about it, their response was "well, it hasn't been tested yet". It certainly wouldn't be hard to test GPS interference. I would expect it should show up approximately as much as the tuna sandwich in my bag.
You mean like the reputed triggering of a fire suppression system thanks to a cell phone?
o ne_brings_down_slovenian/
As found on comp.risks http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/21.20.html#subj3
The register's article is still available, seems to be expired elsewhere.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/01/11/mobile_ph
Over the years FAA has documented numbers of interference with plane system with everything from laptops to cell phones.
GSM is a very clever low power system, and it is GSM that is being put on planes, using picocell http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picocell.
Infact all the regulatory bodies for aircraft all like picocell as they can reduce GSM power output by stopping them seeking towers.
-- email me @ 30,000 ft
Glad to have a 'drivers' viewpoint. Digital technology is particularly an issue. Anything pulsing a carrier will be generated a lot of harmonics (at odd multiples). That GSM causes interference on AM is verifiable so I consider Mythbusters, busted in this case.
See my journal, I write things there
The effect has been idependently tested and confirmed:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06060/662669.stm
I think I'll trust real research from CMU over a vapid so-called journalist who probably just can't stand not yapping on his cell-phone.
BTW, it doesn't matter if some or even nearly all cell phones don't cause interference with flight controls. All it takes is one person using one that does and things get ugly. Likewise, most airplanes have a mix of avionic equipment. Some of it is new where the cost/benefit makes it worth it for the airline to upgrade and some of it is old. Rather than test each airplane independently, it makes more sense to just say "no" until someone comes up with a way that is known to be absolutely safe regardless of the equipment on the airplane.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
You, sir, obviously haven't seen Die Hard 2, which shows what kinds of bad things happen when people have access to telephones on planes!
I don't respond to AC's.
... I'd page Mr Ric Romero. I wonder who's /.'s patron saint of the obvious.
Another option: cell repeaters that block voice but send data (GPRS/EVDO/etc.)
sulli
RTFJ.
They should ban kids from carryon luggage and make parents check them.
Infuriate left and right
He's right that the single biggest reason phones are not allowed on planes is that it would annoy the hell out of many passengers. So what?
Allowing cell phone use on planes would be disastrous: people couldn't get any work done, they couldn't sleep, and there would be many more incidences of air rage.
The ban is justified, reasonable, and a good thing. I hope it will stay in place.
(Strictly speaking, allowing SMS and IM might make sense on planes, but I'd rather not have anything at all than open the door to people like him making a nuisance of themselves.)
Best purchase I ever made was my first pair of these babies.
If I go across country, I make a stop on the way to the airport at my local Costco, buy a DVD series of a popular TV show, and watch the season uninterrupted by screaming babies or anyone else. Even if I dont want to watch anything, I just keep them on, and hear practically nothing at all.
But, you cant go cheap on these things, you have to get them with large ear cuffs that cover your ears completely. Sit down, turn them on, enjoy your flight in silence or whatever you want to access on your laptop, ipod, whatever.
On my last back and forth to NY, I rewatched the whole season two of Gallactica. You can pick up nuance in silence that you miss watching at home. I learned to keep 3 charged batteries for my Thinkpad, so I can fly anywhere on battery power alone.
The real reason is that they wouldn't work. Phones would only work during taxi, takeoff, and landing. The rest of the time, you're cruising along at 3x,000 or 4x,000 feet, and are a good 5-6 miles *above* cell towers. Cell towers don't broadcast their signal up, they use directional antennas that go side-to-side where people actually live. So your cell phone would only work at two times during a flight. Those two times are when ground control/pilot communication is crucial. The benefits (an extra 15-20
minutes where passengers can talk with their friends/coworkers) really don't justify the risks (failure to communicate, even if this risk is quite small).
Reid
The Right Reverend K. Reid Wightman,
It seems unequivocally clear that /. readers are not the types of people that have loud, annoying cell phone conversations in crowded, public environments. Just read these comments! No, the people who do that sort of thing are obviously in another demographic. Yes, this group of refined users of technology practices the most austere cell phone etiquette anywhere.
Actually, I'm sure we've all done this sort of thing a few times: the phone rings in a situation where it would be completely inappropriate to answer the phone. But this particular call is of such startling importance that the call must be answered, just this one time. Because the call is that important, and can't wait.
The widespread use of cell phones is still in its infancy. I hope that one day it will be considered very rude to loudly speak on a cell phone in public. To have your ringer on any setting other than vibrate. To answer during movies or meals. Just as it is now to fart or smoke in close proximity to others. Do people do it? Yes. Is it common? No. Is it legislated? In the case of smoking, yes!
Air travel is generally an uncomfortable experience in the best of cases. Cell phone use is disallowed because of the additional discomfort that would be incurred to most people. Unfortunately, until some social norms have been established, this won't change. That will take time. And in the meantime, it will stay regulated.
Cell phones are a luxury and a privilege, not a right. It's the awful behavior of rude assholes that has kept it firmly limited to that status only.
Forget your conspiracy theroy.
There's a geographic layout which makes a cell-like pattern. The nearest cell tower handles your call and your frequency can be re-used by other callers and towers as long as they are reasonably far away from you. The whole concept breaks down when you move into the Z axis. All the towers will see your signal and none of them will be able to re-use the frequency you are using. Anybody with a few dozen phones could take out an entire city's cell service from the air.
I just flew on a bunch of different planes in the past week, and a couple of them had the control tower chatter actually broadcast on one of the channels of the in-flight entertainment system.
It was actually pretty cool to hear the various airplanes yak with the tower. O'hare is a busy airport (to say the least), and it was astounding to listen to them juggle all the incoming planes. What was particularly funny was listening to them berate our pilot - the guy mumbled a bit, so the flight number kept getting cut off. The tower had to repeatedly ask him to repeat, and eventually they started making fun of him. Things like "well, this particular pilot doesn't feel he's important enough to respond to us". Tres droll.
Also cool was listening to the tower give directions (turn left, etc) and feel the plane immediately respond. All in all, it sounded pretty much exactly like it does on TV/movies. I'm sure if there were any actual flight emergencies, it would have been broadcast for the passengers to hear - unless there's some protocol to shut that channel down when things go amiss - which would just alert passengers to a problem anyway.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
good luck getting a from signal 30,000 feet above sea level
IEEE Spectrum had an article about this last year ( http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/mar06/3069 ); the authors actually sampled in-flight RF data and reviewed some related publications. They also discussed the current reporting methods for HED interference and discussed some of the reports. Bottom line for those that don't want to read the whole article: some cell phones and other devices emit innocuous signals that pose no significant danger, while _other_ cell phones and devices pose significant risks of interfering with avionic electronics, depending on the frequencies they use. This inconsistency alone is a problem. "Sure, you can use your AT&T phone, ma'am. I'm sorry sir, you have to turn your Sprint phone off or we're all going to die". The FCC and FAA do not work with each other (as a rule of thumb), so both the technical and regulatory issues can conflict with one another.
It's a good article for the layperson, I'd encourage reading it.
If someone can't find SOMETHING productive to do on a flight besides talk on the cell phone, well, I feel sorry for them.
you dont want get disturbed when you are joining "Mile_High_Club" ?
The Real Reasons Phones Are Kept Off Planes ...In Space
My work here is done.
Python coder | PyQt Applications | Writer
With the internet you can mute/ignore people. It's much easier to filter out the noise that you don't like. When a person is sitting right next to you on a plane in the middle of a crowded flight talking loudly on his/her cell phone for three and a half hours, what are you going to do about it?
We could put the smokers and the fatties and the children and their parents and the loud talkers and the snorers and the stinkers ALL together into one section. But lets face it, who would be left for the normal person section?
I mean, they don't allow you to sit in the cockpit anymore. Another thing islam has ruined.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
...testing for a commercial airliner is anything but "trivial", I've been asked once to make a simple Weight and Balance application for a small airline and while I worked on it I discovered that there is nothing like a standard airliner. These aircraft are highly modular and avionics are fitted according to customer requirements. That means that a 737-400 made for KLM may be nothing like a 737-400 made for SAS. Testing would be a hell because it is not enough to test just one phone but all different phones have to be tested (we are talking about the potential risk of loosing 400 or more lives because of just one phone) because you do not know wich phone your passangers got.
Another issue is the cellular network... you still need a transponder on the plane... you can't reach the normal network (not at 30,000 feet, wich is usual altitude) and the transponder is costly and got a significant weight, wich is the biggest problem on board... and it consumes power and that equals fuel wich is the second biggest problem.
The best and cheapest solution for everyone is to regulate the price of the call from aircraft phones.
TFA says:
Real testing has been done. Unintended emissions from the phone have been identified as the culprit, not a deficiency in the navigation equipment. The aircraft's receivers are doing exactly what they are supposed to, responding to signals of certain frequencies arriving at the antenna. Once the phone pollutes the spectrum with spurious signals, nothing can protect the receiver. The shielding and filtering must be applied at the problem, which is the phone. Since the competitive consumer phone market demands the lowest possible cost, once a phone meets the minimum legal requirements they won't add another dime of product cost for further interference control.
Intereference does not occur every time, but when it does occur there has been a demonstrable cause and effect relationship. Start with this NASA case study(long pdf warning).
Then consider this article from Spectrum. On page 3:
And from page 4:
It's no conspiracy, and no urban lege
So this is like.. tangentially OT.
But, how much money could I make if I started a business that installed Faraday cages into movie theaters? Could I completely block all cell traffic with one? And could I install the cages relatively cheap and keep them invisible? See, I know there's been talk amongst movie theaters of using jammers to stop cell phone use. But the FCC is against that and it doesn't look like it's going to happen. But can the FCC stop me from constructing a faraday cage around my theater to 'ensure the highest degree of fidelity of the digital projection equipment, thereby ensuring the best viewing experience'?
I'll tell you what, if I know one theater in town has faraday cages and the others don't.. I'm goin to the one with the cages.
A lot of people argue that they need their cell phones during a movie in case of emergency situations. I think that's bullshit. For decades people managed to go to movie theaters without cell phones. They accepted there might be emergencies happening that they weren't aware of until after they left the theater. They accepted this because whenever an emergency happens and you are twenty minutes from the scene you are 99% of the time too late anyway.
Someone enlighten me here, what kind of emergency can you really expect to respond to fast enough to make a difference by racing out of a theater to the scene of the emergency? By the time you get there either the emergency is over or people who are supposed to handle that sort of thing (you know, EMT, Firefighters, professionals...) have already done so. But please, give me an example of how I could be wrong. I'm curious. There has to be something.
TLF
I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
I could misremember, but weren't cell phones used by the folks resisting the terrorists on 9-11?
I seem to remember reports that the passengers used them to learn of the other attacks, and chose to resist, rather than letting the terrorists hit a 3rd target.
I am all in favor of examing the government's actions and policies in order to find out what they really are up to. However I do not think it is too hard understand why a cockpit full sensitive electronic equipment should not be subjected to electromagnetic waves from every person's cell phone who wants to use it on an airplane.
They call me....Tim??!
Nice plot theory, however, I'd like to believe that signal travels better in free-space, thus, even though some antennas are facing down in some places, they still need to cover tall buildings.
If the antennas are placed on top of the tallest building, then they will need to radiate vertically down, I doubt so, that shows that directivity is not perfect. Therefore, I assume signals can go up, and attenuation comes only from the plane fuselage.
Although, It might not be related, have you tried your FM radio when you're in a flight? It sounds loud an clear, and the coverage of each station last really long. I know FM is broadcasting in all directions, but I'm talking about coverage here.
IIRC a cell tower covers a geographic area of 36 sq mi, and assuming that's a circle (I know they effectively chart them as hexagons, but...) if that's true, the radius, given pi r ^2 for area, sqrt(36/pi) = 3.64 miles. That's only 19,000 ft. Sure, straight line would be better than terrestrial terrain, but above 19,000 you're heading out of range anyway, not to mention rapidly switching cells (400 mph = 6+ mi/sec)
If that were the case, it'd be torches and pitchforks for the cellcos if they allow it and then it sucks.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
FAA is very conservative...
When it comes to airplanes, I'm pretty conservative, too. I don't care for fly-by-wire, I don't care for 10-15 year old carbon fibre. (Heh, maybe I should just stay away from Airbus) Neither of these are ready for prime time yet. Put your phone next to your speakers and listen to the noise when it rings. I'll grant that it doesn't reach the power supply and blow up the caps. In fact it hasn't caused a crash yet either. But we're talking about a matter of convenience here, so to me, I think it's fine to go nice and slow.
What?
Believe it or not, but it's not the FAA or the airlines doing the cellphone testing.
It's the aircraft manufacturers.
Boeing and Airbus both run tests, and there IS interference with some of the more sensitive systems on the plane, like, duh, navigation. GPS is better at high altitudes, but when you have to get 6 data values from GPS, you need many more satellite receptions than for just location. Modern planes don't use just gyros for roll/pitch/yaw rates, they confirm it with GPS data. As one might expect, the radio antennaes receiving those can become jammed.
That's the reason you can call on your phone when you're on the ground, but not in the air.
That post is just another Rosie-style conspiracy theory about the FAA and the FCC. I have no respect for people that don't try to understand the sensitivity of avionics and then reject every technical argument as "political cover-up".
Wifi isn't so much of an issue because it is lower power, and on a narrower and very different radio range.
Gees people, stop seeing evil everywhere, there's enough already that we don't need to paint the world as COMPLETELY depressing!
---- I am certain of only one thing : I know nothing else.
I think it probably boils down to cost and caution. The testing is expensive, and nobody wants to be the one that approved cell phones if they end up causing a plane crash.
>>There is no technical nor marketing reason you can't have a cell phone on board, if cell phones were a real danger then they would not be in carry on allowance anymore.
FAA is very conservative, and the FCC is a political body.
It's not technical but social. If that loud mouth jerk salesman doesn't shut up at 30,000 feet I will shove that phone so far up is arse that the vibrated mode will help break down his food.
Just like not telling the passengers what is really happening on the ground, it is too keep panic down. To help a group of people relax. you put 100-500 people in a closed bottle and you have the makings of a mob. The average IQ of a mob is inversely proportional to the number of people in it. therefore 100 people with 120 IQ each, has a mob IQ of about 20.
Do you want that group flying your plane?
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
A receiver has to have an oscillator as a frequency standard in order to lock onto the signal it's trying to get. On poorly designed devices, this can leak out and cause interferance. Since planes use GPS, and the signals are weak to begin with, this is especially a concern.
Yes, but RTCA does. One of the earlier studies I'm aware of was done way back in 1988. The relevant document is DO-199.
Is it forbidden to use a cell phone on a Private Jet or in your Private Plane?
I don't own one, so I do not know the true answer to this, but my gut feeling is that there are no restrictions in this case.
If using a cell phone from above ground level was harmful to the safety of the occupants or damaging to the networks below, then why are there no regulations or carrier contract provisions to prevent it?
I do believe the reason to ban cell phones is money.
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
They got a bundle of devices for that purpose, it is called a R A D I O. You will be amazed but they have these onboard for the express purpose of allowing ground to air and even air to ground communication. Amazing eh? What will they invent next!
And yes, in an emergency the airline CAN and WILL contact passengers in flight AND/OR contact people on the ground if the circumstances require it.
But I got another shocker for you, 99.99% of calls just ain't that urgent. In fact 99.99% of calls ain't even urgent enough for people to be willing to pay for the sattelite phone that a lot of long distance flights have carried for years.
I absolutely agree, keep the bloody cellphones of the phone. Lost productivity == time to get some shuteye to combat the jetlag. Geez, you are 1 mile up and all you can think of is talking on a phone? Real men shag the stewardess. And slashdotters can beg the stewardess if they can please see the cockpit.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Didn't some guy call his wife from one of the 9/11 planes? It's not like that plane cra-wait, nevermind.
By now you should have guessed...I'm your magic negro.
Neither of those are ready for prime time? Is it still 1993? Hellooo! It is now 14 years later. Carbon fiber and fly-by-wire are more than ready for prime time. Carbon fiber doesn't have the problems it used to and computers for fly-by-wire have gotten immensely more powerful. They are both in common use. What was the last airplane you flew on? I'll take miles of wires that just sit there over miles of hydraulic tubing trying to leak at every opportunity.
I'd turn into a crowd of one if I had to listen to someone yapping for hours on the 6 to >10 hour flights I'm usually on. Some people can yell about nothing forEVER.
Given that the yelling is caused by a lack of sidetone, shouldn't there be an easy technical fix? Just put in a circuit that amplifies the caller's voice, and presumably they'd quiet right down. Why haven't the cell phone makers done this?
Many large cities have these things called mountians and tall buildings in the middle.
If this was a serious problem they would at least have signs telling us not to use our cell phones in high places. Even if they could not enforce it it would help.
I think this is the most telling of all evidence that cell phones pose no danger to commercial airliners. If we aren't allowed freakin' nail clippers in our carry on luggage -- which I think everyone will agree pose next to zero threat to the safety of the plane, especially given the locked door to the cabin -- there's no way they'd allow a device you could secretly activate in your pocket which could interfere with the safe operation of the aircraft. Heck, onboard terrorists could all turn on their phones at once! It would be a catastrophe!
Come on now... the word won't end, your company won't suffer huge loss if you can't make cell phone calls or use the Internet while flying on a passenger flight. If it does, chances are, you are flying your own corporate jet. Frankly, I don't care of your corporate productivity loss if it endangers the flight and other travellers by any means.
FLIGHT ATTENDANT 2
I need you to turn off your laptop, sir. It interferes with our navigational systems.
TOBY
You know when you guys say that, it sounds ridiculous to most people, right?
FLIGHT ATTENDANT 2
You can't use your phone until we land, sir.
TOBY
We're flying in a Lockheed eagle series L-1011. It came off the line 20 months ago
and carries a Sim-5 Transponder tracking system. Are you telling me I can still
flummox this thing with something I bought at Radio Shack?
The only thing you can accurately describe as "Scotch" is a sticky tape made by 3M. And it's
At the end of a recent flight I took to Austin, TX, the captain got on the intercom and admonished the passengers for leaving a cell phone on. He said they experienced interference on their radios from a passenger's phone (presumably those GSM chirps).
/ \
\ / ASCII ribbon campaign for peace
x
/ \
As someone who regularly flies across the Atlantic, I thank them.
My favorite example is the one about the bodies of all the dead construction workers buried in Hoover Dam, supposedly to conceal the high rate of accidental deaths on that project. Construction engineers have no patience with that one -- the builders went to a lot of trouble to control the consistency of the concrete. But that little fact does nothing to deter people who like the story -- which seems to he most people.
No, actually part of the licensing requirement for most devices that radiate RF is that they not generate interference with other devices. The interference getting into the speakers is very likely off-band from the frequency the cellphone is licensed (permitted) to radiate in.
Equipment isn't carte-blanc permitted to radiate interference by the fact that it is 'licensed.'
I do not agree with the OP that intentional ignorance to weather conditions and other problems is a consideration. I prefer to fly United because they let me listen in to air traffic control -- not just the communications between *my* pilot and ATC, but every plane on the particular frequency. I have been on many flights where specific weather has been discussed, in particular during thunderstorm season where ATC has steered us around various cells.
The professionalism on ATC channels is very high and matter of fact. It could be hailing golf balls but everything is described in the terms the pilot needs to know.
I prefer to fly United as a closet plane buff and as someone who loves to pretend that I know what is going on. I occasionally even fly MS Flight Simulator on my laptop once at 10,000 feet on the same flight path. I find it fascinating and I enjoy almost every minute of each flight, including US coast to coast flights.
This post brought to you by your friendly neighborhood MBA.
Heh, it's the exact reason Snakes Are Kept Off Planes
I used to work on Aircraft avionics in my earlier days. Unless a pilot has an electrical engineering degree, Pilots generaly don't know to much about the actual working of the electronics on board that they use. The FCC alots frequencies to civilian and gouverment agencies. A hug chunk of the available frequencies go to Avionics/Gouverment leaving only a few frequencies for civilian use (Notice how overused 2.4 GHz is). When frequencies are assigned the useable ones are far enough away from each other so no interferance happens. The electronic equipment is also designed to filter out any other frequency outside its selected range. Example if you talk on one VHF channel you don't hear the VHF channels beside it.
The strongest source of the cell signal is the cell tower which planes fly through all the time. So how would a cell phone effect other systems on a plane? They would not.
"Never say Never."
Gees people, stop seeing evil everywhere, there's enough already that we don't need to paint the world as COMPLETELY depressing!
While you apparently prefer your head in the sand, I am reminded of the old saying that:
Just because you imagine an enemy behind every bush, it doesn't necessarily follow that you're wrong.
1) Directional antenna used at the base station, optimized for coverage of people on the ground, thus poor signal for things above them, probably getting worse with newer technologies and better antenna designs.
2) Rural areas, your not going to get much mobile coverage apart from when flying over major cities, and I'm sure those flying over large lakes, national parks and mountain ranges will get nothing at all.
3) International flights... well no signal over water and lack of subscription to cell companies in the 100s of countries you might fly over.
4) People are scared enough of mobile transmitters on the ground next to schools/etc, what's 300 cell phones in a baked bean can... and who's going to sue when they/there children get cancer (for whatever reason).
That is the way I interpreted the fear of crowd control problems if calls are allowed during flight. cited in the summary. I assumed it was the fear of controlling the crowd of fellow passengers from bludgeoning blabbermouth fellow passengers to death.
Until there is a mechanism on each plane to jettison the bodies of cellphone users who have been thrashed to death by fellow passengers, I don't think the planes are ready. I can't see passengers having to endure long 9-12 hour flights with the bloody mess. And I certainly don't want to discourage anybody, anywhere, from smacking the viscera out of public cellphone blabbermouths.
I don't think there's a single correct concept in your entire post. Impressive. I guess you got most of the apostrophes right, so we'll mark it half-credit.
I fully believe that cell-phones can interfere with aircraft nav systems (the fact that they interfere with PC speakers and conference-call microphones is plenty of evidence for me).
However, there's also a restriction on hand-held TVs/radios and GPSs, and I've always wondered why, since they're all receive-only. I don't see how it's possible for them to cause any interference (or at least no more interference than a laptop computer) since they're only picking up on signals that are already passing through the plane from an external source.
So, does anyone have any info on why those are banned as well?
http://homeoffice.consumerelectronicsnet.com/artic les/viewarticle.jsp?id=37150/ as well as plenty of other reviews mention it (though not many use the phrase "sidetone" to name Motorola cellphones' behavior of having the speaker echo anything picked up by the mic.
For some weird reason, Nokia's don't (didn't -- I suppose its possible their newer phones diverged from this years-old Nokia characteristic).
They tested this on Mythbusters and had difficulty getting phones to interfere even in contrived scenarios such as at point blank range, with very old navigation equipment.
So supposing the FAA/FCC removed the cell phone ban on planes tomorrow citing that Mythbusters had shown it was safe in their TV programme would you feel happy flying? There is a lot more rigourous testing involved than any TV programme is likely to do. For example what about resonance effects of the fuselage enhancing the signal? Long wires in the cabin enhancing the pickup? Single point of shielding failure? (you do know that planes are designed to withstand at least one failure in all major systems?)
Jet Blue offered live on-plane television programming, which allowed the passengers of the plane with the stuck landing gear to watch the news coverage of their problem live while on the plane.
United often allows you to hear the flight deck communications.
Some airplanes still have in-plane phones using something similar to a cell network (with much bigger cells). So not all phones are banned.
If this was the real problem, these things would also have been banned, or never allowed but they are not.
The real reasons for banning phones are:
1) Paranoia by the FAA about malfunctioning devices (which is valid, BTW-- it doesn't usually cause a problem but I have seen radio intererence from many other devices that you wouldn't expect).
2) Concern by the FCC about the effect on ground-based cell systems. I.e. if you use your cell on a flight high above New York, how many cells are you reserving bandwidth on?
This article was largely typicall Slashdot incite....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I mean, they don't allow you to sit in the cockpit anymore. Another thing islam has ruined.
--
vi VS emacs arguments are pointless and a waste of time.
vi is the best.
Attacking a religion like that is just pure flamebait.
You probably shouldn't have brought up Islam either.
Oh, goodbye karma.
"I realise this is not a very popular opinion but it's the truth, and there for needs to be said" -Bill Hicks
Better stay away from Boeing too, the B777 is fly by wire and uses plenty of carbon fiber. Hell, maybe you could drive everywhere?
Then we need a ban on carry on for cell phones, laptops etc...
Naw. We just need a small chamber as part of the 'pass-through' X-ray machine at the airport terminals. It issues forth a MASSIVE emp pulse in the small enclosed area where carry-on items are passed through. "Whoops! So sorry, sir, your equipment seems to be damaged."
I remember weird electro-mechanical handheld 'pong' games from the 70's that would pass that kind of exposure undamaged. That should suffice as entertainment for these 'air travelers,' plus they can carry a few books and magazines if they wish. A deck of cards if they want to play solitaire.
I've seen that same explanation stated several times before when this discussion came up. But the last time I read about it, I believe it was a message thread on HowardForums.com - a site specifically made to discuss cellphone technology. Many users there work in the industry in one capacity or another. One of the guys who claimed he worked on engineering the cell tower infrastructure said that this is really not a true statement. Yes, the phones are designed to communicate with any towers within range. BUT - the cell towers have the ability to handle situations such as a phone suddenly "appearing" on 40 towers at the same time. They have software that knows such things aren't possible in normal cellphone operation at ground level - so it ignores the signals on all but a few towers at a time.
He claimed that in reality, this process doesn't "tax" the towers inordinately at all. The "bandwidth" tied up is no more than a regular call would tie up, since the towers are rejecting the extra instances of the connection to the phone. There's simply a small amount of overhead involved in the towers passing along the information to each other about the status of your connection.
(I believe this type of software also comes into play for handling problems of "cloned" cellphones. If a connection shows up simultaneously on towers that are spread far apart, they know they're dealing with not just 1 legitimate phone, but also a duplicate in service elsewhere.)
Is it still 1993? Hellooo! It is now 14 years later.
That was the last time that people were injured or killed. Minor incidences that don't result in injury and don't make the papers still abound. To know for sure, I'll have to check air worthiness directives and service bulletins. For something a little more recent, the 777 at least one minor control problem also. They can't wait for "Patch Tuesday". These are new machines. Let's see how they age. If we have a more rapid turnover where we are use these things for only 10 years instead of forty, then great, I can have faith that I'm not riding in a "one-hoss shay". If they try to keep 'em flying for 40-50 years, then I'm keeping my feet on the ground. I have much more faith in old hydraulics than I do in old electronics. We already know what happens when the wiring gets old I feel much safer in a Piper Cub. No wiring at all, and no surly stewardesses and drunken passengers to deal with either.
What?
Two questions:
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
If cell phones and two-way pagers indeed had the ability to interfere with aircraft to a point where it compromises safety then the TSA should be confiscating them rather than bottled water and toothpaste. At least it's a more plausible threat than "liquid explosives". Perhaps the fact they are *not* confiscating them is telling.
Actually I'd like to see that. Confiscating a bunch of inexpensive water bottles in the name of security is a relatively benign way of maintaining the appearance of security. Being willing to risk massive public fallout by confiscating expensive cell phones would show they are actually serious.
I can verify from personal experience that MY cell phone does cause interference with radios. I'm a Private Pilot and I have a two year old Sony Ericsson. If I forget to turn the phone off, I can hear a cycling beep sound in my headset every time the phone is transmitting (i.e. ranging to a new cell tower or checking my email etc.) The VHF set also shows that it's receiving, so its actually picking something up through the antenna.
It's not particularly loud, and I haven't had any trouble hearing ATC over it. On a commercial jet... with several hundred cell phones, and the much higher importance of ATC calls under IFR... I can see where it could be a major problem.
Are there ways to solve the problem? Sure. Is it really worth spending the resources to test and resolve in light of the social factors? I'd say no. I personally consider time spent on commercial flights as downtime. I don't want people to be able to get ahold of me, I want to read a book or watch a good movie.
If you really are important enough you HAVE to be in communication 24/7... well buy your own jet =)
"42"
Back in season 3:
l phones_on_plane.html
"It was found that cell phone signals, specifically those in the 800-900 MHz range, did interfere with unshielded cockpit instrumentation. Because older aircraft with unshielded wiring can be affected, and because of the possible problems that may arise by having many airborne cell phones "seeing" multiple cell phone towers, the FCC (via enforcement through the FAA) still deems it best to stay on the safe side and prohibit the use of cell phones while airborne." -Wikipedia
You can read more about it here: http://kwc.org/mythbusters/2006/04/episode_49_cel
I thought the real reason was that the phone companies are worried what happens when too many of their base-stations get contacted simultaneously by the same cell phone/s. They probably can cope but are unable to do the real insitu testing.
Artificial intelligence is the study of how to make real computers act like the ones in the movies.
With all the background noise on a plane they'll be screaming at their phone. Until someone shanks them in the neck with a rolled up skymall mag.
I was on a SQ flight from HK to SFO that had the boeing wifi and was able to use skype. The quality of the call was really good but the background noise on the plane meant that I needed to talk very loud. So I hung up as soon as possible not to disturb those around me. Wouldn't count on everyone else doing the same.
>...is that no-one, including the people who make the decision about phones on planes, wants to spend their next long-haul flight next to
> someone yakking on their phone for the entire time.
Except of course for the business-class asshole who can afford to swipe the amex through the card reader on *their* phone and pay for the privilege of being an annoying loudmouth. They are perfectly happy then.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
Emirates allow it and other airlines seem to be following suit. That said, we are talking GSM here. http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/12/21/wired.airlines/
Naw, driving is for the birds. It's just that when it comes to flying now, I'd rather do it myself. The airlines are a miserable mess anyways because the customers put up with so much crap and accept such lousy service. Ten hours on the tarmac...jeeze! And that whole system can be shutdown when someone whispers "bimb", I find a bit humorous to tell the truth. Such fragility! Electricity and airplanes don't mix :-)
What?
Especially if the salesperon is one of those people who subconsciously raise their voice while talking on the phone. About half of the people who talk on a cell phone talk above a normal conversational level, apparently thinking they have to shout when the person is so far away they can't see them.
BTW, if you're reading this that means that the odds are 50/50 that YOU are one of those people. Ask your friends.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
Many reasons may be technical.
But even after those reasons are resolved, I think airlines will keep them banned so they can maintain a monopoly on communications.
When in question, follow the money.
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
One thing that is missing from this conversation about cell phone towers is that the cell towers are explicitly designed to adjust power levels in order to improve the "Quality of Service" that you were alluding to here. When you are further from a cell tower, the power will be turned up until you get handed off to another tower. This is one of the algorithms in fact that is used to determine what cell tower that you should be using.
If instead you are cruising at 40,000 feet (not unheard of at all for passenger jet travel), that is nearly 8 miles in the air. Most cell towers are designed to hand off to another tower that is much closer, but when you are up at that altitude, there is no other tower to hand off the call. Admittedly the call handling algorithms could be adjusted to deal with changes in altitude as well as terrestrial longitude and lattitude, but for towers running on 10 year old operating systems and software this doesn't surprise me.
I would imagine that this is also a problem in areas with larger mountains, where certainly a caller on a 15,000 foot peak can cause some similar kinds of problems with contacting multiple towers and nearly all of the same kinds of problems that are being blamed on air travel. I don't see any sort of call to ban cell phone usage from mountain tops. In fact, the U.S. Forest Service highly recommends that you take a cell phone with you if you go into the back country as at least one method to contact outside help. With federally designated wilderness areas literally bordering the city limits of a U.S. Census Bureau Metro are where I live, this isn't as far fetched as it may seem at first glance.
Another 2 issues have escaped the discussion :
1) The cell towers antennas are designed to concentrate all energy in low altitude. After 3-4 km altitude, there is no coverage. Typical comercial flight is at 8 km altitude.
2) The cellular communication is limited to 100 m/s velocity. I don't know if this limitations is due to doppler or just the rate of switching the cells.
Again, typical jets are more than 200 m/s .
Imagine a five hour flight with someone yapping on their cellphone the whole time...
You have it backwards.
I've sat next to people with thier cell phones hooked up to EVDO networks while cruising 500mph downloading and uploading emails and work and have been doing so on these networks for years while they travel. The technology is already ready to handle the load. Its probably a little tougher for the feds to track your cell usage though The idea of a tracking software tracking your packets from 24 different towers sounds pretty difficult.(Tin hats needed) I can see the idea of crowd control though. But you'd only need to train your flight attendents to better handle emergency situations.
This is a joke, right? Reception is based on line of sight. While some would say that distance is also a factor, this is really only due to line of sight issues. Granted any device is 6+ (35k ft) miles above any tower (and some Non-Euclidean x-y distance tangentially away), has some effect on signal strength; but this is negligible for EM transmissions - in fact reception is bound to be orders of magnitude better from 6 miles above. So, using the line of sight factor, you don't get any better line of sight than from high above.
Why is it so many people seem to be so dense that they can't understand that when you are traveling 500+ mph (~1mi/7sec) that you're going to have crappy phone calls not because of reception, but because the networks can't pass you from tower to tower fast enough. Not to mention the fact that you can "see" and compete for every tower for a several hundred mile radius (at least). Of course, you'll probably only consider the ones in a 20 or 30 mile radius directly below as being strong enough to negotiate with. Come on people this has got to be 7th grade Physics. Hmm?
Of course, if they ever let people use their cell phones on the plane, I'll never fly with my daughter. She can sit on the phone for hours having the most annoying and inane conversations. And forget any flight inside California. I mean, Totally! Of course, we'd no longer have to worry about terrorists on planes, they'd be throwing themselves out of the planes to get away from the cell phone junkies (along with a good portion of the other inmates). On top of which, I think it violates the Constitutional ban on cruel and inhuman punishment. And lastly let's not forget, we'd have scores of airline personnel going Postal on us! No thank you! When it comes to cell phones on airplanes, just say NO!.
I can tell you the TRUE reason cell phones are not allowed on airplanes.
I fly on Air Force flights, which are not subject to FAA regulations, and the main problem with cell phones on airplanes is the fact that they DO NOT WORK. The transmitter in your phone is not powerful enough to reach more than say, 1000m. Your phone will go dead at less than 10,000 ft of elevation. Add this to the fact that cell towers are not powerful enough to reach the average cruising altitude of ~30,000 ft.
Fear of instrument interference was due to older, analog units with less defined spectrum. With ALL equipment in aircraft being shielded these days there is almost NO possibility of a disturbance in flight.
Besides, your 50mW transmitter is no match for, oh, the sun. And all the other background noise that is present in our atmosphere these days. I would bet that the electric motors on the landing gear ( or hydraulic pumps that may power them) put out more EMF in just about every frequency known to man than all the cell phones that might be in call at once.
I'm fighting The War on Drugs!
But if it is a chance that it is dangerous, why doesn't them strip search us.
Or have an electronic tracing device to control us?
As I've said here before, there's been plenty of testing of whether the cell phones interfere with flight instruments and the results are negative. Seriously, do you think everybody remembers to turn the phone off every time? Of course not. I'd go so far as to say that most flights have a few cell phones on inside the cabin.
Now, here's the other side. Let's imagine the fairy-tale world where cell phones do bring down airliners. Is the fix to tell everybody to turn them off, or to fix the plane so that it can't be crashed with a $50 piece of equipment that 99% of the passengers own?
Fairly obvious, eh?
I thought nothing much of this until I was flying into Manila one time, sitting in the front row with a bulkhead & flight attendant seat directly in front of me and the gentleman to my side. He was furiously getting his "I'm back home" texts typed into his phone so that he could send them on the ground. The poor stewardess nearly had a heart attack (I'm serious) when she saw him with a phone turned on while we were landing. She really thought we'd crash if he didn't get it off immediately. I was in the unenviable position of getting him to turn off the phone (he'd been taking advantage of free drinks for most of the 10 hour flight) while simultaneously trying to assure her that phones don't really make planes crash. She was hyperventalating.
It struck me then that lying to people about the real reasons for not allowing phones on the plane was causing just a little bit of harm, probably more than the phones would...
Do you have ESP?
...wouldn't it have been easier to come on the intercom during the flight and tell people that a phone was interfering instead of after the flight?
It's unlikely that cell phones transmit anything significant outside their licensed band - it's your audio equipment thats at fault.
I need to point out that VOR navigation has gone the way of the DoDo bird. I cannot imagine anyone in a modern aircraft spending the time to fiddle around with triangulating VOR's when the GPS is sitting there telling the pilot the current position within 10 meters, current groundspeed, and the exact distance to any point on the planet (within 10 meters). The nav radios are now used as a backup to the GPS, if at all. (Autopilots rely solely on GPS.)
I suppose one could make an argument that VOR's are useful in case the GPS fails, but I would retort that one would be much better off with a second redundant GPS on a separate power supply. Which system sounds more reliable: one based on a collection of a couple dozen satellites with no moving parts located *above* the aircraft where there is no weather or terrain and cannot be vandalized, or a system based on hundreds of rotating VHS radios scattered around on the ground, subject to weather, terrain, vandalism, and maintenance problems? Also, it is a simple and prudent matter to mount the GPS receiving antenna so that it is looking up and shielded from RF radiated from below. (A secondary receiver can be located below for extended inverted flight, if that is a concern.) GPS is in all ways better than VOR.
Secondly, the whole interference argument is moot. It doesn't matter. Out of the 137 passengers on a 737, how many of them have mobile phones? I'll guess 30%, or 41. How many of them actually turn their phones OFF when told to do so? I'll guess 50%, leaving 20 phones actively seeking cell towers for the duration of the flight. As far as interference goes, there is really very little difference between a handset trying to negotiate with a tower and one that is locked on and transmitting data. In fact, the device typically radiates more power when negotiating. The only way to prevent this situation is to be absolutely positive all the devices are OFF (including the ones in the baggage hold) -- an impossible task, or move the devices out of range of the towers (five miles UP) -- an inevitable task. So the solution is either impossible or inevitable, neither requiring any action on anyone's part.
Furthermore, radio communication is most critical during takeoff and approach. This is precisely when the devices onboard are the most active -- low altitude over populated areas, within range and transitioning cell tower coverage at a rapid clip. And guess what? Not a single significant incident reported. There have been anecdotal reports, but nothing more than mild curiosities.
This whole argument is a bunch of hooey. The airlines just want to figure out a way to monetize the connections, others want people to just shut the hell up and let them sleep, and the FAA is (as usual) in a state of paralysis. (This is usually a good thing.) The only thing I am pretty sure about is that it has nothing to do with radio interference.
However, if passengers did want, and were allowed, to use mobile phones openly (as opposed to furtively ;) ) in flight it would require a system to relay the signals to the network in a way that overcomes the problems of distance and speed. This will most likely (must be?) a small cell tower (picocell) located on the plane that relays the signals to a satellite link, then down to a central terrestrial hub. Once all the onboard devices discover the very nearby cell tower, they all back off to their lowest power settings and contently sit in low-power mode for the duration of the flight. Even if the picocell were not relaying the signals I think it is the only viable method to control the user devices. But this is a few hundred thousand dollars per aircraft to install, ongoing maintenance costs, and additional regulations and contracts. Not to mention media headaches when some tech blog points out that the airline is now bathing the passenger cabin with microwave RF. So it does not surprise me that this is happening slowly, but I am confident that within the next five
I doubt the reason for the bans is a real threat of interference is because if there were one, they would control them much more strictly (i.e. ban them from carry on luggage completely).
I think what this article proposes has some truth. A lot of people are bothered when sitting next to someone talking on a cell phone. And the airlines probably also enjoy being able to rip off customers with the in flight planes.
Most of all, and another reason put forth in this article, is that even though no one is really worried, if they remove the ban and something happens, they're in trouble. And it doesn't bother anyone enough to get past that.
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
If there is a 'real' reason for no cellphones on planes, I think its about time we found out the *real* reason people are not allowed to bring decent quantities of drinking water on planes.
It is, surely, trivial to test whether a given substance is H2O. I mean, how hard can it be?
It is, surely, trivial to test whether the container has got a false top containing water and the rest of it contains some other (possibly explosive) substance. Those xrays give pretty detailed views plus you could push a probe down the mouth of the bottle and wave it about. They do this to passengers all the time.
Therefore there has to be a reason why passengers are not allowed to bring *water* onto planes.
One theory is that the homeland security guys figured out a way to harm an aircraft by pouring enough water into or onto a certain area of the passenger compartment of the plane; flooding it with a conductive fluid.
Any other offers?
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Nice plot theory, however, I'd like to believe that signal travels better in free-space
Ok, you can just put your faith in your belief, or you can click on the parent link and see someone who tested it scientifically.
And the person who actually tested this is a professor of computer science at the University of Western Ontario, a mathematician, environmental scientist, and author of books on diverse subjects.
Slashdot is a hard place to figure out, if someone believes in God, then actual science is the only thing that really counts with the slashdot crowd, but if someone presents actual science, then faith in a personal belief overrides the actual science?
The way Professor Dewdney tested this makes pretty good sense to me. He took a plane up and made a chart of how well a cell phone worked at certain altitudes.
transporter_ii
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
See this article:
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/news/2004-12-16-c ells-planes_x.htm
Note that the phones actually made to talk air to ground also suffer poor reception. One would think that with signals traveling better in free space, that of all the issues, reception on a system designed specifically to talk air-to-ground, wouldn't be an issue.
USA today states that cell phone don't usually work at high altitudes. Note that the above statement didn't come from some "nutty conspiracy theorist."
Note that because cell phones don't work well at high altitudes, and if they manage to do so, cause problems on the ground, they have to put a small cell phone tower on each plane, plus figure out a system that allows only certain towers on the ground to be used.
transporter_ii
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
One of my older desktop machines blue-screens if I use my phone in close proximity. I also have some older monitors that show effects EM effects when the phone rings. I don't think claims that cell phones can possibly disrupt the working of electronic equipment ridiculous all. I've seen what phones can do first hand to my own equipment.
If cellphones were really really dangerous, we'd have aircraft graveyards everywhere, especially around airports.
What do cellphones talk to? Cell towers. Where are those towers? EVERYWHERE, and they all operate at much higher power levels than any handset.
If there was some sort of danger, cell tower signals from the ground -particularly towers near airports where they are always A LOT of such towers- would be knocking planes out of the sky on an hourly basis from miles away. Every airliner in the sky flies over hundreds of these towers on every flight. It would be like the worst anti-aircraft fire ever devised.
But it doesn't happen.
And cell towers are hardly the most powerful transmitters in the wild. A cell tower throws out a couple watts. A TV transmitter can throw out a million watts and there are thousands of those towers too.
Aircraft operate happily amid a sea of RF and generally nothing goes wrong. So the idea that a wimpy little cell handset are threats are just overblown assumptions, unproven and unrealistic.
Sig for hire.
It's generated in the part of the phone called the "network", which, among other things, contains something called a "hybrid coil", which allows the single pair of copper wires to separate the outgoing and incoming voices. In addition to that function, there's also a "sidetone coil" that couples a sample of the outgoing voice into the receiver circuit.
In electronic phones, it's done slightly differently, but there is absolutely no reason it can't be done in cell phones, and it often is.
The explanation is correct in one respect, though. Increasing the sidetone will cause the talker to lower their voice.
Used to take phones apart for fun, have designed hybrid circuits.
I don't think "It was the airplane's problem for having faulty shielding, not the electronic device" would be much of a comfort to relatives. Can't we just be a little patient while the last of the analog phones (which really can interfere) disappear, and the FAA/FCC test out onboard picocells? People here talk like addicts -- as though somehow its impossible to not use your phone for a few hours.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This is more or less the case. I was watching CSpan as a bill considering the use of laptops which connect over the cell network on airplanes was debated, and the debate got straight to the point: We should allow laptops because they are not intrusive, but no one likes a cell phone call on an airplane so the nuisance should continue to be banned. At no point during the Senate debate did anyone show proof of serious harm to the airplane or cell network from cell phone use, and it's interesting that no one had any serious objections to laptops connecting wirelessly over that same network.
Although the cell network concern is somewhat legitimate, the truth is it's a simple software problem of anticipating this kind of broad network access and handling it appropriately. It's not a serious technical challenge, it's just a limitation of SOME cell networks, for now. If the law changes, so will the software, so it can't be taken seriously.
There is also some legitimate technical concern of radiation affecting internal plane signals. However, this kind of interference is only possible on unshielded cable on the plane, which presents a problem whether a cell phone is on or not.
There are many reasons rumored (even by the FAA!) for the cell phone ban and the above are the only 2 with any technical basis, and even they just take a little more investigation to reveal their lack of merit. What was enjoyable was that the Senate debate didn't spend more than a few minutes pondering the technical concerns - they accepted them all as crap and moved directly to the nuisance issue, and focused primarily on that for the entire debate.
I was on a flight into Fort LedeeDa Fla, and after we landed all the cells where turned on calls where being placed and the pilot just stopped the plane, told everyone to turn off the phones as "I am unable to read the radar", so with that said I have no problem pulling the battery out of mine and not turning it back on until we hit the gate.
I did get to ask the pilot the what and why, as he explained it, he said the radar on the plane gets static like white noise on a tv when there are more than 10 phones transmitting calls, he also said normally they don't care when they are going to the gate but because it was foggy that night he needed the radar so he didn't hit anything.
-- I am the NRA, enough said...
Airplanes are full of obnoxious louts that don't belong out of the attic, much less in public. If people start blabbing about their pathetic, meaningless lives in a claustrophobic metal tube, I won't even need boxcutters.
Slashdot: Playing Favorites Since 1997
Sure I agree with the article, BUT look at the possible waste of taxpayers money. I consider myself a frequent traveler, last year only I had each week 2 flights. My job is in another country. That is 1.5 hours of flight time each direction. But look at reality: - with all the time I had 1.78% of flight time per year - the cost of certifying everything I will repeat - I AM a frequent traveler. Now count the percentage of flight time an average person in your country spends? I suspect that it is less than 1%. And are you willing to spend substantially more for technology that will only let you do something(make calls probably) in less than 1% of your total time? PS: Between 1992 and 2005 I had 0% flight time average annually. Count your own, before complaining not able to call during a flight.
Hmmm - I was on a flight last year which was struck by lightning on final approach - I'm stunned that the planes systems can take massive broadband interference spikes from lightning without missing a beat and yet they are threatened by the milliwatts of signal from a cell phone.
Dear idiot: Cell phones don't interfere with airplane avionics. There are several hundred idiots every hour on flights all over the world who are too stupid or ignorant and can't see their way to shut off their phones. If cell phones were really an issue, we would have heard of dozens of airliner crashes related to cell phone interference. The truth? It hasn't happened, and it's not going to happen.
If it really were a problem, airlines and airport security would fight cell phone use tooth and nail. Airlines would install cell phone detectors to be used before pushing away from the gate. They would have a constant detection system to find out if someone turned their phone on during flight. Etc, etc, etc.
The truth is almost always found by following the money. If you follow the money, you'll see that there are a few basic reasons people aren't allowed to use cell phones.
1) Cell phones interfere with the existing business model where airlines can rake in $6 a minute on AirPhones located in almost every headrest. The airlines won't generate revenue from cell phone calls. Airlines have campaigned heavily with the FAA to prevent cell phones from being used in the air. They want the money from offering services on flights. It's the same reason you can't walk into a night club with your own bottle of liquor. The night club wants to sell you booze, it's part of their business model.
2) No one wants to pay for cell phone testing. The FAA will demand that cell phones are tested because the airlines will say that they HAVE to be tested because they will not give up their existing revenue from AirPhones. The FCC won't step in and pay for it. The cell phone manufacturers won't pay for testing. The carriers aren't going to pay for testing, even though everyone can see that cell phones are harmless. Politicians, (especially those in the People's Rebublic of New Jersey, the People's Republic of Connecticut, and the People's Republic of California) will step in with their wisdom, generated by whomever happens to give them the largest campaign donation. If it's John Kerry, he will waffle back and forth at lest 3 times. If it's Nancy Pelosi, she will say that it's a Bush issue, and if it's Harry Reid, he'll make sure that he gets a new house, and options on several hundred acres just off the Las Vegas strip.
3) No one wants the liability. If someone brings a cell phone on board, and it turns out that it truly is defective and does interfere with other electronics, who is liable in case of an accident? The airline? The FAA? The FCC? The cell phone manufacturer? The owner of the cell phone? Your friendly politicians?
There are too many lawyers like John Edwards sitting out there waiting to bring $300 million dollar class action lawsuits to court so they can take $120,000,000 and 4,000,000 passengers will get a $45 coupon for their next airline ticket.
I prefer the status quo. Once the door is closed and we push away from the gate, I know that the loud conversation from 4 seats away detailing Farmer Ted's gall stone problems will end as soon as the flight attendant raps the offending passenger on the shoulder. There's nothing worse than listening to some inept moron scream into a cell phone to some un-named relative, talking about the most inane topic.
And I am a business traveller. I fly 2 or 3 times a week. I don't mind that cell phones are off on commercial flights. I have no need to yak while I'm in the air. I actually appreciate the peace and quiet. However, when Wi-Fi service is offered, I can guarantee you that if someone pulls out a VoIP handset, or even an earpiece with a boom mike, I will likely spill my drink on their laptop.
"Ooops. Your conversation startled me. Sorry. Can I get I get you some club soda to clean that up?"
Do you really want to sit next to a real estate agent trying to sell real estate on an airplane? Or some investment seller trying to push crappy stocks on little old ladies? Or how about listening to some housewife gossip about the neighborhood? No thanks.
The approach to my local airport takes us right over all the TV & Radio masts.
That's one of the best things about United Airlines. Their in-flight audio system usually has the cockpit audio chatter available as a channel you can listen to (usually channel 9). There is a kill switch for this audio in the cockpit, of course. Unfortunately sometimes pilots hit the switch and then forget to take it back off, so this channel ends up going silent for the remainder of the flight.
Dr. Demento On The 'Net!
Learn2text
Ban yapping, allow people to text whatever they wish. It is easy and is the general rule in many transit systems around the world. If you REALLY need to communicate with someone on the ground during flight, text is sufficient.
I WILL gouge the eyes out of the first person I ever hear yapping on their phone on the plane.
> Not a single significant incident reported. Well I sure wouldn't want to be in the plane that will be the first one reported. And I bet you wouldn't also.
thanks - I only did the minutes. Still darn fast for cells!
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Is that a counter-argument or an observation? Either way, it is pointless.
Aircraft will crash. I hope I am not aboard when it happens. But I also hope that people will spend time worrying about real dangers and not waste their time on issues that have proven over the past fifteen years to be benign.
I agree if some changes to the algorithm are done it could be optimized for use in air. The major problem for me is the noise with about 50 people over the phone(some business calls and some trying to pass time) would make my 12 hour flight miserable. Even if GSM/CDMA phones are never optimized with the advent of wifi in the air along with wifi phones would be definately allow us to talk clearly in the air without even the fear of interefernce. The sound issue is something you guys definately wanna consider. While business can be done on text/email it would atleast defy the arguement of losing alot of money because of being out of touch.
I can only hope that the pilot used good judgement in choosing to wait until the plane had parked at the gate. I would guess that the interference was temporary noise on their headsets.
/ \
\ / ASCII ribbon campaign for peace
x
/ \
How can you just casually make a claim like that? Do you know what brand of cell phone it was? Do you have a spectrum analyzer and you've taken readings and are certain that brand, or even just that specific cellphone doesn't have something wrong with it so that it radiates harmonics outside the band it's licensed in?
RFI used to be taken a lot more seriously than it is now.
Maybe, just maybe, these people talk above their normal tone because the people on the other end couldn't hear them. I know it's more likely that the world is full of assholes you should tear down constantly, but I like to enumerate the possibilities.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
This is absolute nonsense. I can already use the telephone built into the back of the seat in front of me, if I am prepared to use my credit card to pay for the very high cost per minute... The real reason for the cellphone ban is that the airlines want to be able to squeeze every possible thaler out of the passengers. Beef.
..it radiates harmonics...
This is my point. The harmonics are weak, but they exist. Just like a freak wave in the ocean, you can get the same in RF. A "perfect storm" so to speak. Anything could happen if you have 50 or 100 phones together in such close quarters inside that giant Pringles can.
What?
A plane flying at over 10.000 meters is out of range of the cell phones bases. A typical cell phone tower has a range of 2.000 meters at most. So in a plane there is no signal for the cell phone. You can get a signal for a short period of time after takeoff and before landing, but not during the flight. And as a side note, I would hate to have some asshole yelling at his cell during a night flight.....
PEÃ'AROL: SerÃs eterno como el tiempo y floreceras en cada primavera
It IS an effect of the copper loop. Telephones contain a hybrid coil (hybrid network), the purpose of which is to separate / mix the sent & received audio. It's a clever application of balanced networks.
Unfortunately, the copper loop is a complex impedance and varies with line construction. There are various balance network options (e.g. TN12, etc) which try to approximate a 'best match' to the line, but they're not perfect. The end result is imperfect isolation across the hybrid - i.e. some microphone sound appears in the earpiece.
Oddly enough, it was found in the early days of telephony that this was in fact desirable; it made the phone sound more 'natural'. After all, when you speak normally some sound does reach your ears via the air - an effect which is reduced when you put a phone up to your ear. So, in fact, it's a happy accident that telephony hybrids are imperfect.
Mobile phones don't have this effect (separate transmit/receive frequencies or timeslots), and the electronic hybrid in some wired phones is too good at matching the line, so some mic sound is deliberately mixed back in to the earpiece audio to create sidetone. AFAIK, the only reason why this is less effective in mobiles phones is purely a power issue - the mixed audio is reduced to an absolute bare minimum in order to shave a few microamps/milliamps off power consumption, and so extend battery life.
(That's an overly simplified explanation - but, yes, I WAS a telephony engineer...)
What part of "a well regulated militia" do you not understand?
The other passengers ! what about every one else that doesn't need to make that amazingly important business call or talk for hours to the love one there going to see when they land ? please god airlines is the only place where i am free form my phone, don't bring it there !
I remember being on a flight where someone had their cell phone on in an overhead bin and just sat there and let it ring for several minutes during the descent/landing stage of the flight. It was pretty close by as I could clearly hear it ring.
After we had landed the pilot got on the PA system *pissed* that they could not do an instrumented landing because of this and called out specifically that same cell phone.
I know that GSM phones can sometimes put out several watts and thinking about what happens when a GSM phone is near a CRT or speaker when one rings scares me.
If I were to guess one problem is not that instruments outright fail but they out of necessity operate in paranoia mode and may spit out warnings/errors based on relativly small effects.
However IMHO for as long as people have been living with this and the numbers that take to the skies each day it seems like realitvly simple technical problem to resolve from the issue of flap protection for cell spamming and any possible interference with avionics. I agree that essentially the real problem is the will and or politics - not technology.
Given the low level transmitted power from a cellphone and the fact that good quality filters are easily available to the designers of the phones I think it is unlikely that theres any significant radiated power outside of the licensed band. Poor quality audio equipment is a lot more common than poor quality transmitters. The frequencies that cellphones operate at and therefore any harmonics are much higher than any frequencies your audio amp or even your radio receiver should be responding too.
Of course - nothing is perfect, I know I shouldn't be able to hear the cop behind me running my plate through my car radio but it happens sometimes.
If I'm literally shoulder-to-shoulder with the people sitting next to me on the plane...and they are allowed cell phones...I'm pretty sure the real reason is that fights are going to break out on planes over rude cell-phone users....
That static sound you hear...
Langoliers... Langoliers!!!!
I like quite on planes. It is one of those times where you can shut off your phone and ignore email, guilt free, and know that the world will wait while you relax (granted, in cramped quarters) and enjoy the ride. Flying has enough crap to deal with; security, traffic on the way to the airport, lugging poorly designed pull behind suitcases because you spent the extra money on the new laptop tucked inside. There are few people who have jobs that are so god awful important that they can't wait to send email or make a phone call until they are off an airplane. Those that do either fly private planes with in plane phones (that actually work) or know not to fly when they have something important going on. President of a country - important enough to make a call in flight. Systems engineer for any company - well, looks like your system is down until you land and you should have put more thought into your disaster recovery plan.
I don't want to listen to some woman next to me complaining to her girlfriend about how her "babydaddy don't pay no support" any more than she wants to listen to me telling my PHB that "it isn't my fault that the client hasn't changed their backup tapes in 6 weeks. I called them three times a week and told them..."
I live in a US metro area with a subway/rail/metro/tube system. The morning and evening commute hours are relatively free of phone conversations. Most of the people that have to are quite and respectful. That, right there, is exactly what you want to have when you are putting a large quantity of people in a small space. Quite and respect.
I love my technology as much as the next guy, but there is a time and place for everything.
Oh, there is a very real danger from allowing cellphone use on a plane. It's called the danger of getting my laptop shoved up your ass if I have to listen to your half shouted conversations while I'm crammed into a flying sardine can next to you for 3 hours.
I have a quad-band world phone. Whenever it is in the car, I can tell that it is running GSM. When the phone chatters to a cellsite using GSM and I have my radio on, I can hear the carrier buzzing in the speakers. If the phone is running UMTS, I don't hear a thing, even when on a call. With planes being fly-by-wire, I don't think they want the risk of a phone pinging and, by chance, telling the plane to go into an uncontrollable dive as the cell phone signal gets into and messes with the data communications within the plane. Plus, the phones would have to run at full power to try and talk out of the flying tin can that you are in let alone that cell towers are all constructed with downtilt radiation patterns to limit their operational area to allow the cellular concept to work. Not a good thing at all. Maybe if a plane can be certified for this service, and by having its own cellsite inside and talk out via AirCall and bill the service to you, then it may happen. The plane would have to be tested with phones to see if they would interfere with the avionics. I doubt that this will happen in the near future, usless there is huge profit $$$$$ available and people were gullible enough to use it. Me, I prefer the caller to visit my voice mail.
on public transportation. Everyone texts. It works perfectly.
The sound of someone talking on a phone is incredibly annoying to many people, including me. At least on a train or bus, I can move further away and know that the ride is short. I will literally rip the eyes out of someone who dares yap next to me in a plane and not shut up after the first time I ask them. I consider it that inconsiderate.
Barring some apocalyptic emergency, talking on a phone while on a plane is a luxury at the expense of everyone around you, and is completely over the line of civil behavior.
It is obvious that cell phones are not a safety hazard. That's the lie they want you to believe. If a cell phone could bring down a plane, they'd never allow them on there in the first place, as they'd be an obvious terrorist weapon. Think!
Listening to one side of a phone conversation is far harder to ignore than simply ignoring a conversation. It must be psychological, and may not affect all people, which is why some people don't seem to understand what the bother is. Combine that annoyance with the fact that people yell at their phones, and I swear I will gouge anyone who dares yap on a cell phone on a flight (emergencies excepted).
The solution is simple. Ban yap, let people text. Works great in public transportation all around the world.
There's a wide range of planes in between "crap we threw together in the shop" and "latest, greatest, private jet". I'm going to guess the little Dash 8 puddle jumpers I fly on frequently don't quite have the same level of electronics. In fact, I know they don't, I can see right in the cabin before we depart since they are so small.
While it may be the case that the latest planes are totally immune (but you'd have to do a bunch of testing to convince me of that) it isn't like the just replace planes every year.
There is a lot of talk about terrorists, but if memory serves, it was passengers using cell phones and in-seat phones on United flight #93 that clued in the passengers that 3 other planes had been hijacked and crashed, presumably giving them the will to fight back agaisnt the terrorists.
Only if you've got a first generation analog brick-phone using FDMA. Since G2, the handset/cell interaction has been digital (The cell network was always digital) using TDMA or CDMA.
TDMA on a moving target requires the handset ensure that the transmission occurs during its assigned timeslot. There is an acceptable amount of error built into the length of the guard interval between assigned timeslots. Violate the TMA assumptions of the code for calculating transmission timing significantly enough and the handset starts blabbing over into someone else's timeslot. Degradation of service occurs. This can be fixed by increasing the guard interval, but that reduces available bandwidth.
CDMA was created with the shortcomings of TDMA in mind and does not suffer from them for the most part. The "soft-handoff" the CDMA performs as a handset moves from cell-to-cell could present a problem for the handset if it transverses through many cells rapidly and simultaneously. How the network deals with a rapid string of handoffs is entirely up to the carrier. One carrier flogged "no connection charge for dropped calls" back in the day, kept the code around, and ended up with malicious users being able to get unbilled calls by forcing handoff back and forth between cells before the tab started. The same thing happens unintentionally if you fly across a city and are legitimately changing cells fast enough. Who knows what other weird implementation specific things happen... The problem isn't with the technology, though.
Simple Machines in Higher Dimensions
Well, not that I care one way or another, but...
It's pretty easy to determine that your navigation equipment may be unreliable when it's lightning out. Not so much when someone is fiddling with their electronic device.
Buckle your ROFL belt, we're in for some LOLs.
When I checked in at the Airport to come home from Shanghai, they told me that these were forbidden on planes. Does anyone know why? I majored in physics, and the reason that these might cause a problem is not obvious to me.
Great! so cell phones can disrupt airplane navigation systems? (presumably a cell phone in check-in luggage could do the same. Or an intentionally designed transmitter in luggage)
Why the heck did my wife get her manicure set taken away before boarding the plane if the technology itself is susceptible to non-intentional interference. Bruce Schneier gets my vote for calling airline security since 9/11 what it is, "movie plot security".
The day a carrier allows cell phone usage in flight is the day they lose me as a customer. It really is that simple, and this author is dead-on with the 'crowd control' comment. It is already unbearable enough with the amount of cell phone chatter just during boarding. Some day people might actually realize they aren't quite as important as they think they are and they might actually turn off their stupid phones.
While I appreciate the technical points being made about the ludicrous reasons cell phone bans are kept in place I must disagree with the overall stance and thwack this dipshit with the clue stick.
The ban is necessary for precisely the reason that he gives a scant one sentence observation: "They [the airlines] believe cell phone calls might promote rude behavior and conflict between passengers, which flight attendants would have to deal with."
If you do not believe that is a valid reason for keeping the ban in place then ponder this scenario: I really hate flying. It makes me incredibly nervous. To do it while traveling to a family member's funeral, as I did recently, is truly unpleasant to say the least.
Now suppose you were sitting next to me, typing away at your laptop, when suddenly your cell phone rings with that cute tone you use, and you start conversing, probably loudly because of all the ambient noise already present in the cabin, about this month's P & L statement, or your latest CSS trick. If this is a quick call, where an e-mail wouldn't have sufficed, and ends in no more than a minute, no harm done.
BUT, if this call continues past a minute, and something tells me it will, then you have crossed a boundary. You have, in essence, farted in the elevator with only one other person present and 30 floors to go.
I will not be able to help from being rude and insensitive toward you either, and you can just imagine what form MY rudeness might take. Because you, my friend up until now, have failed at a simple task. You have failed to respect a social covenant that has been in place since planes began flying. You have failed to recognize that we are in an airtight elevator together, and that despite my not having a cell phone in my ear, I do have a life equally as wonderful as yours.
If you violate, expect no less.
1. VOR navigation is alive and well. Listen in on ATC sometime. You appear to know nothing about aerial navigation.
2. A cell phone left on isn't the same thing as a cell phone being actively used. You appear to know nothing about how cell phones work.
3. Can you predict with any certainty how RF energy will be reflected around in a conductive tube of very complex shape from various and variable locations? If not, you know nothing about how RF energy is going to bounce around inside a plane.
You've spouted off about your lack of knowledge, and you've been refuted by not only anecdotal evidence posted here from multiple experienced pilots but also with studies demonstrating RF interference on aircraft and actual documented incidents of the same.
You're a fucking dumbass twit, and too stupid to realize you're stupid.
Just look all the stuff they certified as Vista-ready!
I scream. You scream. I assume that means we're both acquainted with the problem. We proceed.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
You can redesign every plane, but still, it moves at 500mph, and the fading and Doppler effects will kill the cellular signal. Your handset is not capable of operating at these speeds.
As someone who flys A LOT, I really hope they never allow cell phones on planes. Bad enough with the annoying people kicking your seat and talking loudly to eachother, not to mention the random flatulence, the people that want to "be your friends" and the screaming babies... If I got some stupidly self-important businessman or some other twat talking loudly into their cellphone on a 10+ hour long-haul flight, I would troddle them. I doubt even my very costly Bose QuietComfort headphones have a noise cancelling setting for the "annoying people who don't have any regard for others" category.
Do not underestimate the power of confining someone to a small space for a very long amount of time, limiting their oxygen supply, feeding them bad food, and then subjecting them to someones mindless rattling into a cell phone. It could break a man. Aren't their laws against "cruel and inhumane punishment?"
Just watch. The first airline that allows cellphones will have an inital spike in ridership as everything thinks "what a great idea" and then their sales will plumit after people realize just how very annoying this really is.
Well about the nail clipper thing. Some nail clippers have a metal nail file on them with a pointy bit on the end (for digging under nails) which could be used to attack and possibly kill someone*, sure the attacker won't be able to use it to get into the cockpit, but it could potentially create a hostage scenario. Only some of the nail clippers people have would be a possible threat, but it is too complicated to ban just a specific sub-set of nail clippers so they ban them all.
This may not be the actual reason nail clippers are banned, but it makes sense to me.
* by stabbing them in the neck in this scenario, where you could certainly go through a major artery.
If you use a mobile phone at 30,000 feet, you sometimes get a crossed line and find yourself talking to an alien. The governments don't want everyone who uses a phone on a plane to know that aliens exist.
>We can put a man on the moon -- and let him chat with his friends in Houston for the whole trip.
Haha, we never went to the moon!
Why do we need to be able to use our phones everywhere? Can't we exist for a few hours without being firmly attached to the network? Can't people exist without you for a short time, can't you exist without others for that time?
It's not a big conspiracy, it's because the issue is tremendously unimportant that the ban is not lifted. Why would anyone risk their career lifting a ban that has worked fine for many years when there is no clear benefit to allowing cell phones on flights?
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
if (number_of_towers_detected>=MAXIMUM_NUMBER_OF_TOWE RS_ALLOWED)
{
stop_searching_for_new_towers();
}
I was on a plane from Denver to Jackson WY.
The flight attendent told us that the pilot could not see the airport, being a plane full of locals who had flown in and out several times (including at least one pilot) we looked out the window and said, "no. Their it is."
She left, and came back and said "the tower won't let us land"...we all were silent. How could we land if the tower wasn't going to let us. She played the trump card...except we all knew that Jackson has no tower. Someone asked her to repeat herself. Someone else asked her to verify with the piolot. She went forward and came back, confirming that the tower would not let us land. We went nuts. It started out polite enough, but once she added that we would not be comped a room because the delay was weather related, she had a real revolt on board. She refused to to admit that she lied.
Eventually she went forward and we never saw her again. I think she hid in the cockpit while we disembarked. We did not land in Jackson, we flew to SLC Utah and were comped a room. I understand that the young guy on the plane who was still going bonkers when we landed got comped an additional flight voucher.
But the fact is it happens all the time. People lie. Being on an airplane does not stop that, it just means their is no place for you to run.
Twenty minutes befor us and fourty minutes after us a competing airline landed their jets.
Can't we just sit quiet for a few hours? read a book perhaps?
If the threat of interference was so great, I would expect that the FAA would prohibt carrying a mobile onboard whether powered or not. I once took a flight where I powered off my phone, then stowed it in my carry-on. Upon landing and retreiving my phone to make a call, I discovered that it was already powered on. I suspect that the power button was bumped during transit. We experienced no problems during the flight, and the crew made no mention of potential communication/avionics trouble (as if they would anyway).
Mythbusters attempted to expose the impact of mobile phones on avionics. They found that raw instruments will be effected by such transmissions. However, commerical planes are so well shielded, that even a high power RF generator cause no problem when transmitting inside the cabin at typical GSM, TDMA, and CDMA frequencies. Note, this was a Mythbuster show, and not a true scientific study. But all things considered, I suspect that the social reasons outweigh the technical.
I for one appreciate that mobile phones are not allowed on planes. Commerical flights are unpleasent enough without the added noise of mobile junkies.
Wrong! If that was the reason, they'd be shouting on landlines too. The reason I talk loudly on my cellphone is because I assume the sound on the other end is as crappy as it is on my end.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
MythBusters has already tested this, and the frequency that cellphones use does (believe it or not) interfere with navigation systems on the plane. To be perfectly honest, how this even got posted to /. is beyond me.
The guy can't even get the most basic facts right.
. html
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TRAVEL/03/02/phones/index
"A new study by scientists at the Carnegie Mellon University shows that interference caused by mobile phones may create more interference to aircraft navigation systems than previously thought.
If true, the findings -- which also reveal that many passengers are flouting current in-flight cell phone bans -- could call into question airline plans to wire jets to accommodate mobile networks.
The Carnegie study, carried out with support from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, showed that phones and other portable electronic devices such as laptops or games consoles can interfere with critical aircraft electronics."
Hello:
Just because cell phones interfere with airplanes should not be the reason why it should be banned. A technology can be created to avoid this.
A Cell phones has become a very indispensable communication tool that we can hardly do without on a daily basis.
Ikey Benney
http://mscsrrr.com/elite-affiliate-program.htm
The creator of $100,000 monthly for life system. http://www.secret33.com/home-based-business-progr
Have a Nice Day
By way of contrast, I thought I would spice things up a bit with a few links to actual data.
:)
. asp?id=80
Nasa, via a program called the ASRS, maintains a database of all aviation "safety occurrences" since the 40's - this is online and somewhat searchable. Good architecture in action.
http://aviation-safety.net/database/
A report about "safety incidents" related to the use of Portable Electronic Devices (PED's) based on their data was released a while ago.
http://asrs.arc.nasa.gov/report_sets/ped.pdf
This seems to be the result of a search; it includes everything from frightening incidents with malfunctioning instrumentation that have been associated with PEDs, to "1st class passenger won't turn off his cell phone" reports. But in the end it's clear that there are some worrying issues with PED interference - or at least the waters are muddied enough that I wouldn't expect relaxation of PED use restrictions to be entirely safe without costly equipment upgrades and testing.
And why, really, should this money be spent? So your call doesn't have to wait a few hours?
But TFA does make one critical point - if planes are fragile enough for consumer devices to interfere with them, this isn't about passenger convenience - this is a major security problem. Plane electronics do need to be properly shielded, or it's a matter of time before someone begins deliberately attempting to exploit the vulnerability. The debate about whether cell phones should be allowed in flight in general is less interesting to me, personally.
For those curious, there have been some more determined efforts to explore the problem by more professional trade journalists:
http://www.issues.org/19.2/strauss.htm
http://www.popularaviation.com/ListNewsArticleDtl
Tired of Political Trolls? Opt Out!
Since you are such a fan of ASN, surely you noticed there were 1,059 fatalities in 2005 compared to 3X that in the state of Texas alone for the same year? Is it not enough for you that millions of people fly daily without incident? Nothing you have come up with occurs regularly. I suppose you don't drive for fear that you'll have a blowout. Those happen all the time, you know. Flying is easily the safest mode of transportation. You are just being irrational.
The assertion is not that it does not work. The assertion is that it will degrade the quality of service for all users and that if use of airborne cellular were widespread then in fact the system would not work because the spectrum would be overused.
Are you making a specious argument, or do you in fact not understand the discussion at hand?
Uh, the problem is the reverse of what you think it is. The problem is that you will have LoS to too many towers.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Give that man a cupy doll.
Telecommuting! What about socialization?
Yeah, I never was good with numbers. That's why I stay away from Vegas, too. Please don't take what I say too seriously, but I'm still in no hurry to take unnecessary risks for the sake of convenience and profit. What's the hurry? It's a little like a kid crying because the batteries wore out in his new toy. I consider the demand a wee bit irrational. Regardless, I may be irrational about the airlines, but flying in the Cub is still much more pleasant and relaxing, and worth the risks. I'll let the Wall Street scammers squeeze into their kerosene burning tin cans.
What?
The assertion is not that it does not work. The assertion is that it will degrade the quality of service for all users and that if use of airborne cellular were widespread then in fact the system would not work because the spectrum would be overused.
Are you making a specious argument, or do you in fact not understand the discussion at hand?
I guess I don't understand. So what if you _can_ talk to several towers? Your call is only going to be connected to POTS on one. I'm not sure how the election of a tower works, but I can't imagine it would be so bad as to tie up an entire 64K data channel. We all have digital phones now, there's no frequency allocation for a particular phone call, everything steps all over everything else.
The towers and phones should know who's on the system, which phones are strongest to which towers, how fast phones are moving away and towards other towers, and the rate at which a particular tower<->phone signal is increasing or decreasing in strength. That way towers can chat with each other for routing information and hand-off between towers can be coordinated to hold onto a call as long as possible, given a margin of safety against dropping the call.
So, that's how I figure it ought to work, but I'm ignorant as to how it actually works, and what I missed.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Ever heard of something called "Farady's cage"? Besides, once you're on landing, you don't need that much information, you can visually SEE the spot where you're going. It doesn't mean the systems weren't damaged, but they weren't needed to the same level. On landing you're relying mostly on onboard gyroscopes to give you attitude data and on ground radar for accurate altitude. A plane's GPS still isn't precise enough to guarantee that level of precision. Hence you can get hit by lightning and not worry about much, but a cell phone from inside your cage can totally garble up your radio signals...
---- I am certain of only one thing : I know nothing else.
No, there is frequency allocation. Oh sure, the frequency is shared (CDMA, TDMA, etc etc) but nonetheless, a frequency is still allocated. In addition, the multiplexing depends on phones behaving themselves, and also depends on them not moving too quickly, or latency has to be added which decreases bandwidth across that frequency. The faster you're moving, the more latency is needed.
It does, but there are two issues. One is that many of the cellular implementations are crap because they work "well enough". Another is that the system just isn't architected for the phones to be able to see that many towers. It's not just implementation, but also design.
I only understand a little bit of why it doesn't work properly myself. But the issue is that one or two cellphones in use in the air are not going to bring down the network; it CAN handle a bit of abuse. People using their phones from the top of the sears tower etc, who can see literally dozens of cells at once, are not taking down the cellular system. But if everyone started doing it, the system could not handle the abuse. Okay, so this is because the system is lame in a lot of ways. That's fair. But it also means that (assuming it's all true, after all I am only playing parrot here) the cellular systems can't take it until we get a revised, more intelligently designed standard.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"Add this to the fact that cell towers are not powerful enough to reach the average cruising altitude of ~30,000 ft."
:-)
Just curious, what is the average cruising altitude of a cell tower?
Sorry, couldn't resist!
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
Okay, so this is because the system is lame in a lot of ways. That's fair. But it also means that (assuming it's all true, after all I am only playing parrot here) the cellular systems can't take it until we get a revised, more intelligently designed standard.
I like to hack rather than re-design. Because the towers know about latency, they basically know about distance. I wonder if you could use the routing information in the cell hand-off protocol to basically mask out the furthest clients from a tower if other, closer, towers already know about it.
I suspect they'll never implement any fixes unless they have to, so until the FAA/FCC allows cells on airplanes the cell towers won't be able to handle cells on airplanes. And if it's cheaper to buy the FAA/FCC than update the towers, that's what they'll want to do as the profit from calls in the air probably isn't worthwhile. Why do I keep coming back to "regulatory capture sucks" all the time?
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Because if I get on a plane and someone is talking on their cell phone in a typical loud American style way of conversing - for 2-3 hours - in an enclosed space, I'm either going to (after warning you politely twice):
1. grab the phone and throw it to the rear of the plane (or front, if we're at the rear);
2. grab the phone and break it (the hinges don't go that far);
3. grab the phone and immerse it in my coffee; or
4. use it as an anti-theft device against you (bonk).
Sorry, but there are limits.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
No, because the radio signals from the telephone will still be reaching every cell within LoS. That signal still has to be interpreted and either ignored or something done with it.
Definitely the easiest way to go about it is to put microcells in the planes; the phones will see this cell nice and close to them and reduce power. Of course, this assumes that the phone will play nice, which is probably an unsafe assumption.
Air carriers will like this scheme because they can find a way to charge you for it (directly to you, or through roaming agreements.) Cellphone companies will like this scheme because they don't have to do anything to accomodate it.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
No, because the radio signals from the telephone will still be reaching every cell within LoS. That signal still has to be interpreted and either ignored or something done with it.
Yeah, I was figuring it would be ignored. I have trouble believing there are enough cell phones in the air that adding an ignore layer would overwhelm the network. OK, maybe would/should is the issue there.
You're right, though, a microcell is better, but is it GSM, NexTel GSM, CMDA, etc? If there are compatibility problems, phones could get stamped with a logo at the factory if they comply and the non-compliant ones could be prohibited.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
There aren't yet! But there's lots of air travelers, especially in certain areas, and when you get a good, unobstructed line of sight, you can get amazing range. If a significant number of passengers started using their cellphones (or just leaving them turned on and not in airplane mode) there would be problems.
It's going to have to be all of the above.
The problem with that is that cellphones tend to be heavily reconfigurable via software.
I do have a possible solution, though; just use VoIP over WiFi. Cellphones with WiFi are becoming more common and WiFi won't cause this problem as it is high frequency, lower power, and has less range, not to mention that it's spread-spectrum. Just require that passengers have a WiFi phone that can be placed into WiFi-only mode by an external beacon - THEN you can have your logo stamped on the phone.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Taking kids on flights is more likely a necessity[1] than talking on a cell phone is. As much as they annoy me, I'll usually give parents the benefit of the doubt, as long as they're trying to make the kids behave. Someone chatting on a cell phone? No way.
Have to agree. I empathize with the kid, stuck in a boring cramped space. I empathize with the parent, with a kid who just really should be taking a nap at home. But I have zero empathy for the loud person talking on the cell phone next to me, when we all are forced to suffer a CHOSEN imposition that was chosen by the person with the cell phone to be imposed on the rest of us.
Your rights end where mine start.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I do have a possible solution, though; just use VoIP over WiFi. Cellphones with WiFi are becoming more common and WiFi won't cause this problem as it is high frequency, lower power, and has less range, not to mention that it's spread-spectrum. Just require that passengers have a WiFi phone that can be placed into WiFi-only mode by an external beacon - THEN you can have your logo stamped on the phone.
Hey, I like the way you think! Were it not for regulatory capture this would be a great solution.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
"They believe cell phone calls might promote rude behavior and conflict between passengers..." Count me in! I would ragefully assault a jackass sitting next to me who screamed into a cell phone for 5 hours on the ground and 3 in the air. Actually, any hours at all. Exceptions s/b allowed, but then anyone who feels that the cell phone "ban" is endangering them or violating their civil rights should just damn the torpedoes and make the call. In my experience, there are many cases in which the petulance of air stewards is a justifiable risk.
... then presumably my mobile phone jammer would also be allowed (one of the relatively sophisticated, low-power ones, not a tower-fryer). That way, the poor over-worked flight attendants wouldn't have to deal with anyone near me arguing to their neighbours to shut the fuck up and let them listen to the movie. Maybe more people complaining about not getting reception, but that's not their god-given right anyway. (And until it's part of the ticket price, I doubt the flight people are going to care.)
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
a bunch of people, sitting all around you, talking overly loud on their cell phones, while you are sitting there peacefully reading your book?
I want a bunch of people around me reading or sleeping, not talking on their cell phones.
That seems to be the point of the main article is that this should be the reason why the rule is in place: For crowd control and keeping the interior of airline cabins quiet.
Only the FAA (and FCC) is coming up with bogus technical explainations that many people with a background in physics and technology can cleanly refute as a logical answer. The only ones really fighting back here are hard-core avionic engineers, who legitimately have to send their stuff through very tough engineering tests before it is qualified for use on an airplane. And they wonder why some 2-bit cell phone company using an imported device gets a pass on doing the same sort of testing.
This is how police can detect the use of a radar detector in area's where it is illegal.
t or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar_detector_detec
Yes, I see your point. I overstated my point about VOR vs GPS. I should have said "VOR is going the way of the DoDo bird." rather than "has gone". I agree that VOR's are still in wide use, that navigation charts prominently describe VOR's, and that ATC's still use radials as landmarks.
Avionics systems are all about redundancy, and so using both VOR's and GPS as inputs into a flight management system makes perfect sense. I never dealt with such a system myself as that was well outside my price range. My FMS consisted of two nav radios, a map, and a ruler.
However, I stand by the assertion that GPS is superior to VOR and that reliance on VOR is rapidly diminishing. If I had to choose between having only VOR or only GPS, it would be an easy choice in favor of GPS. I am a little confused by your reference to augmentation (VLF?).
However, this whole issue is off the main point, the assertion that mobile phones would endanger aircraft because it would interfere with VOR navigation. I am arguing that this is false because:
If airlines wanted to allow passengers to use their phones during flight it would take more than simply telling them it is OK. Everyone would quickly discover that there is no cellular service at 45,000 feet. And at lower altitudes it is more about preparing for emergencies than radio interference.
I was trying, perhaps unsuccessfully, to point out that the whole VOR interference argument has very little to do with it.
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That's the cut to the chase point yes. If cell phones are such a problem then they should not be allowed in carry-on. You can't expect a terrorist hoping to crash the plane to turn their phone off when asked after all - and it's trivially easy to hide the fact that the phone is on. It's also trivial to carry a bag of 50 such phones without arousing any suspicion (50 people can go through security with one each and transfer them to the passenger). It can't be too hard to modify a cell phone to output obscene amounts of RF without it being obvious (other than by measuring the power output or noticing that all the TVs in a block radius buzz a little) - they sometimes ask you turn laptops on, never seen them ask for a cell phone though. Of course you could modify your laptop too as well, so I guess that's moot (I've also never seen them rummage through the laptop bag and get you to plug in all the usb/pcmcia devices in the pockets).
The fact that they don't let you carry a bottle of soda through security but do let you carry a cell phone seems to indicate it isn't a real problem. Or that security is a retarded farce. Sadly that second option is just as, of not more, likely.
You are forgetting about the inverse square law. Yes, the cell towers have a lot more power than the phones do, but the phones are much closer to the airplane electronics than the towers are. Distance dominates here.
As a rough estimate, sound power is also inverse square. Think of how much louder a person talking next to you is than a stadium of people yelling a the top of their lungs at a football game 10 km away.
The typical 'ring initiator' signal emitted by cellphones has an adverse affect on Eurocopter ECUs - it causes the turbine to drop its output by approx. 200 RPM.
Not cool.