Cell Phones in Flight

[Hai Perso Coyone?]

Can't beleive it?

Check it out:
http://tech.msn.com/mobile/pcwarticle2.armx?GT1=6119

Cheers,
Ashar

[Hagar]

Quite honestly I can do without it. Listening to mindless idiots constantly chatting away at the top of their voices to anyone they can think of is bad enough in the street. I can't think of anything worse* than being trapped on a plane with one of them sitting next to me.

*PS. Yes I can. One either side of me. It doesn't bear thinking about.

[eno]

Quite honestly I can do without it. Listening to mindless idiots constantly chatting away at the top of their voices to anyone they can think of is bad enough in the street. I can't think of anything worse* than being trapped on a plane with one of them sitting next to me.

*PS. Yes I can. One either side of me. It doesn't bear thinking about.

I totally agree ....... and you can't even open the window to chuck the phones and their owners out.

A friend of mine when faced with a journey from London to Glasgow sat next to a stockbroker type who's phone  almost never left his ear and when it did it rang and rang untill he answered it. 1st Politely asked the guy to turn his phone off as he was becomming an irritant. 2nd When the guy refused as he had buisness to conduct, picked up the phone, when it burst into life for the 50th time, answered it and told the guy on the other end that his buddy could be reached on a number from the nearest town, walked calmly to the lobby near the toilet, opened the window and threw the phone out.
When the guy protested and threatened legal action, the whole carriage shouted him down and refused his pleas for them to be witnesses to my friends hienous crime.

One up for affermative action  ;D

[Craig.]

Well it looks like i wont be flying the airlines which approve this. While i do own a cell phone myself i try not to use it on public transportation. You have to shout to be heard usually and i dont want half the passengers knowning what i want for dinner And i wish others would have that same respect. Flying is the last place you can get away from phone, if your call is that important, use the airphone, it'll be worth the cost of the call, if you cant justify the cost, then your call isnt important. Besides recent polls showed 70% of passengers didnt want the ban lifted and the majority who did were kids

[Hagar]

[quote]One up for affermative action

[eno]

OOoooo I'm able to correct Hagar on something. Cellphones on petrol station forecourts are banned because of the risk of a spark.
The electrical field doesn't effect anything, apart from other radio signals, that much. People have tried wiping memory chips, magnetic strips on cards etc with mobiles all to no effect .... even with prolonged exposure.

[Hagar]

I stand corrected although I believe this used to be the case. Interference was certainly the reason for them being banned from our flying field but that rule was introduced some years ago on the advice of the BMFA. I attended a lecture on the subject at the time. As with everything else, technology is improving all the time & I imagine the risk of the latest mobile phones interfering with sensitive electonic equipment is now either non-existent or too low to worry about.

PS. http://www.north-ayrshire.gov.uk/na/Trading.nsf/0/BCF615BF3F2F75FD80256EE70033FCFB?OpenDocument&MenuType=Business&DocDisplay=NoDoc&DFBC=Trading%20standards&CatLevel=1%7C%7C

[Rocket_Bird]

Cell Phones on aircraft, although are an annoyance to passengers as well, can seriously affect flight avionics and electrical systems.  They interfere with antennas and a whole bunch of other hardware.  While learning the autopilot systems, an experiment was conducted in which a cellphone was brought into proximity of the flux valve (the component in which some aircraft's HSI compass systems is connected to for the removal of errors from precession and such).  While observing the AC sinewave characteristics from an oscilloscope when the cellphone was put even in some proximity of the flux valve, the results are quite frightening  :)

[Hagar]

While on this subject, I can remember going to air displays where spectators were requested not to bring mobile phones on the field as they could interfere with aircraft instruments. I noticed several people blatantly using their mobiles during the display. Makes me wonder about the human race sometimes.

[Saratoga]

Ahh the beauty of being a pilot, there is a cockpit door between and the babbling idiots.

I don't like this idea though, they need to just drop it. If it can't wait 'til you land, don't fly!

[Nexus]

Does cellphone transmissions do any harm? Nobody knows really. That's why the US Federal Communications Comissions currently are investigating the subject. And guess what: There's a very big chance you'll be allowed to use the cell phone in a few years.  :-/

The reason for the cell-phone ban is that it was suspected that mobile phones could interfere with the navigation systems. But unless you stand with a 15yr old NMT phone right in the avionics bay(exaggeration  ;D)...I'd say it's pretty safe.  ;)

[Saratoga]

Ya the FCC has I believe a 737 they are literally packing full of people with cell phones and trying to create a hellacious situation to see if the plane will have any problems.

As much as I hate to say it, I hope something goes wrong (but the plane is still flyable) so they keep the ban, would be nice.