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Electronics In Flight — Danger Or Distraction?

Posted by Soulskill on from the ways-to-get-tackled-by-stewardesses dept.

another similar writes "IEEE Spectrum has a blog post revisiting the debate on whether electronic devices pose a risk to flight avionics spurred by a NY Post article about Arianna Huffington's refusal to power down her Blackberry during takeoff. The post points out the EU's removal of their own ban on cell phone use in 2007 and the likelihood of significant non-compliance daily in the US — and curiously, planes haven't been falling from the sky at a similar rate. While the potential exists for there to be a problem, it would appear the risk is low. Ever bent the rules? Is an app for landing commercial jets somewhere in our future?"

4 of 532 comments (clear)

  1. Re:EU planes still don't allow. by JLangbridge · · Score: 5, Informative

    Don't confuse this. Electronics are banned on take off and landing for different reasons, not just for interference. Electronics are banned for radio interference, because that is the easy explanation, but one of the multiple reasons is passenger attention. Take off and landing are, statistically, the most dangerous times, where all passengers are required to be attentive to what goes on. When you take off at night and they dim the cabin lights, some people say that it is for electrical considerations, but it also gets your eyes used to the outside light in case you need to evacuate. Airplanes and procedures are carefully planned so that you can evacuate quickly in case of an emergency, and people being distracted form electronics isn't really a good idea.

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    The urgent is done, the impossible is on the way, for miracles expect a small delay.
  2. Experience from an actual pilot by michelcolman · · Score: 5, Informative

    I'm an airline pilot, and a colleague of mine (on a Boeing 737/300) once saw his fuel quantity indicators suddenly jump to zero. He asked a cabin attendant to check if anyone was using electronic equipment in the cabin. One passenger, sitting next to the wing, was using a portable CD player. He was asked to turn it off, and fuel quantity indication returned to normal. Switched it back on again... indications went back to zero. The cause of the interference was later determined to be the motor of the CD player, which is rapidly switched on and off to keep a variable speed necessary for reading data at different distances from the center.
    Personally, while flying in the cockpit myself, I have forgotten to turn off my cell phone many times. This usually just resulted in a drained battery but no ill effects on the airplane. On a few occasions, it even started ringing during final approach. I never saw any fluctuations in the instrument indications. However, I have heard the typical noise on the radio "trrrrrrrr tkt tkt tkt tkt", which I'm sure pretty much anyone has already heard when a phone was about to ring and it was close to a radio. The instrument landing system receives signals on frequencies pretty close to those of ordinary radio, so I can imagine it being affected in the same way. But I haven't actually seen the needles jump as a result.
    In any case, this interference is VERY unlikely to affect the flight controls. Most landings are done manually, so interference should not actually be able to bring down an airplane. However, in foggy weather, the plane is landed automatically and in this case, it's probably safest to just keep all electronics off just in case the autopilot suddenly behaves in some weird way. Planes have crashed because of relatively minor errors in input, for example the radio altimeter reading an altitude that is much too low, and the plane thinking it's above the runway and bringing the power back to idle while in fact it's still at a few hundred feet. That sort of thing. Yes, it can happen, and planes have crashed as a result.

    1. Re:Experience from an actual pilot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      I'm a pilot as well. I haven't had instrument interference but I have had the GSM syncing signals be sufficiently loud that I had to make Air Traffic Control (ATC) repeat instructions. I was in the clouds at the time, so following ATC guidance to the letter was absolutely required for flight safety. Turning off electronics is a reasonable rule, because you actually talk to ATC a lot during take-off and landing.

      It's easy to experiment with this yourself. Take any GSM cell phone (others will do it, but GSM is by far the worst) and hold it near a speaker. Turn it on and you'll hear it chatter packets at the cell phone tower.

      As a fun aside, I've actually had similar issues with military radars from over a mile away, so it's not just stuff in the plane...

  3. Re: Is an app for landing commercial jets... by furry_wookie · · Score: 5, Informative

    >pilots do not wait until the aircraft is 300 feet off

    Actually your REQUIRED TO perform full autolands every 90 days in each aircraft in order to keep it certified to perform such landings when you 'really' need its help.

    (work for airline, wrote the system that keeps track of the compliance)

    Also have been in aircraft cockpit several times during autolands and even performed one myself in the full SIM. It's pretty amazing.

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    -- Given enough time and money, Microsoft will eventualy invent UNIX.