Transportation Department Proposes Allowing In-Flight Phone Calls (go.com)

Yesterday, France's Le Monde newspaper issued a report, citing documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, that says American and British spies have since 2005 been working on intercepting phone calls and data transfers made from aircraft. Assuming the report is accurate, national security agencies may soon have their hands full if a new proposal by the Department of Transportation becomes official, which would allow each airline to decide whether its passengers will be permitted to make in-flight phone calls using the aircraft's onboard Wi-Fi system. ABC News reports: The Department of Transportation's proposal leaves it up to airlines whether to allow the calls. But carriers would be required to inform passengers at the time they purchase a ticket if the calls are allowed. That would give passengers the opportunity to make other travel arrangements if they don't want to risk the possibility of sitting near passengers making phone calls. The Federal Communications Commission prohibits using mobile phones to make calls during flights, but not Wi-Fi calls. There is a minimum 60-day comment period and the proposal leaves the door open to an outright ban. The Wall Street Journal first reported on the proposal.

Comments

What's the point

[Patent Lover]

If you're dumb enough to pay for that shitty wifi on flights good luck making a voip call over it. You're lucky to get an email out.

Re:wifi jamming

[ncc74656]

you are charged based on the downloaded amount

Are you sure of that? Last time I flew Southwest (just weeks ago), it was $8 per device per day, with no cap, though it's slow enough that you're not going to download huge amounts of data anyway.

Why babies cry on planes

[Okian Warrior]

I've been next to a baby that was on full wailing for quite some time, despite the mother's best efforts and that was considerably worse than any idiot yapping on the phone. Didn't really want to make me throw myself or the baby off the plane, but I was quite happy I didn't have to deal with that every other hour of the day.

In flight the cabin air pressure is reduced as the plane goes up in altitude, to an equivalent altitude of about 9,000 feet when the airplane is at cruising altitude. This reduces stress on the airframe, by about 5-ish PSI on every inch of the cabin outer surface.

Adults have the ability to clear their eustachian by yawning, but babies generally don't. The extra air pressure causes their ears to ache for the entire flight.

That's why babies cry during an airplane flight. Mothers don't generally have to deal with it all the time.

(I wrote the firmware for one of the popular air cabin pressurization systems currently in use.)