

FAA to lift mobile shut-down rule - mumbi
http://www.zdnet.com/faa-to-lift-mobile-shut-down-rule-7000021045/?s_cid=e550&ttag=e550

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cheald
Good. If they were actually that dangerous, we wouldn't be allowed to carry
them on board.

Shutting down cell radios makes sense; as I understand it, a bunch of
cellphones moving at a couple hundred miles per hour can do some nasty things
to cell towers, but it drives me absolutely insane that flight attendants
gripe at me about turning off my Kindle. I usually just turn the backlight
off.

~~~
omegant
As a commercial pilot I must say that cell phones and other electronics, have
an influence in navigation and comunications. It has evolved over time though,
the past generation airliners (like B737-200 and MD80) that didn't have GPS or
laser inertial navigation, used a magnetic sensor(it detects the earth
magnetic fields and gives the data to the navigation instruments) that was
easily disturbed by the first generation of cellphones. It could change your
heading indication up to 40 degrees. The worst cases where due to the pilot's
mobile. Also cd players and the first portable nintendos used to have a
mesurable effect on those planes. Modern airliners are better isolated and
shielded, also modern electronics transmit with less watts and are better
designed. It has become a smaller problem defenitely. For example the problem
with comunications is not a big one, it can be a bit annoying (like when you
hear your car radio and the cell phone starts receiving a call), but I haven't
hear of any mayor comunication failure or trouble caused by that. The only
problem remaining is that the most sensible fase of flight is a low visibility
approach with the autopilot engaged. In this mode the airplane is using highly
accurate radio signals from the ground station, and radio altimeter readings
to guide itself till landing. The frecuencies are very different, but when you
have 100 people trying to con ect their cellphones to call home and say that
they are landing (while at 200 knots). The phones have to try very hard to
connect to the ground antennas. This is not a problem if everything is working
properly. But if a cable or a computer is in bad conditions(remember that
avionics suffer from physical stress that is not usual to ground equipment:
humity, vibration, shocks), that may cause bad signals that may triger a
system failure (this is the best case as this way you may go around and try
again safely), or just modify signals enough to degrade de autopilot behaviour
but not trigger an alarm. Although rare, this has happened and it's been the
reason the prohibition has been kept all this time. I suppose that the
stadistical and technical study of this faults have led to understanding that
this cases are more unusual than they used to be. Also it's a fact that even
if you ask people to shut down their electronics, there is always a part of
the passengers that simply don't know how to do it (older people), have theirs
at the checked luggage, forgot it on with the laptop(the rest of us), or
simply ignore the crew and hide the phone. So effectively enforcing the
prohibition was impossible. I still recommend to set everything in flight mode
at least for take off and landing, as we the pilots usually do (please don't
tell anyone!), that way you'll also save battery.

~~~
JulianMorrison
Seems to me the answer is to put a cellphone "tower" in the plane so the
phones all connect to that at low power and stay connected to one place.
Meanwhile the plane itself can relay to ground via more sophisticated means
designed for flight.

~~~
Filligree
Or even not relay, depending. The point is to keep them at minimum power, not
necessarily to allow phone calls.

I figure that if cellphones actually mattered, the FAA would have long since
required such devices in airplanes.

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mistercow
The thing that gets me about these rules is what an insane threat to national
security it would be if they were actually necessary. If anyone really thought
that mobile devices could significantly interfere with instruments on an
airplane, they should 1) raise hell over fixing our obviously broken planes,
and 2) demand that we put some effort into actually making sure that people
are turning their cell phones off (for instance, by actually checking, rather
than asking politely).

~~~
snom380
It's a matter of trade-offs of convenience vs "better safe than sorry". It's
not a binary either-or decision. Just like with lithium batteries, which can
still cause nasty fires. Yet they aren't banned because if they were, it would
be a huge inconvenience.

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fossuser
This looks like it will change little. You'll still not be able to listen to
music on your device (even if the music is local to the drive) during takeoff
and landing.

The only change is that you can leave your phone in airplane mode instead of
having to power it down.

I don't know anybody that actually listened to the flight attendants. Most
people just put their phones in airplane mode anyway.

So basically nothing actually changes. It would be nice to be able to listen
to my music without having to hide my headphones so I don't get yelled at.

At least on Virgin they don't bother you because they just assume you're using
their entertainment system (which I'd imagine generates more interference then
whatever your little device does). I guess on their system you have to watch
advertising though - makes it worth it to them.

~~~
piyush_soni
Huh. Why would you not be able to listen to music in airplane mode? I always
do it on my phone, as I have them on my SD card. Now with the new rule when
you will be able to keep the phones in airplane mode while take off and
landing, I should be able to listen to music without interruption.

~~~
xachen
Taxi, takeoff and landing are the most critical parts of a flight. If
something goes wrong and you can't hear instructions, chaos etc because your
distracted with your music then you are a danger to yourself and your
seatmates around you.

~~~
mistercow
Is that actually an official position though? I've only ever heard it as post
hoc rationalization. There might be a bit of sense to it, but on the other
hand, it's not hard to jostle someone into paying attention, as I'm sure your
neighbors would. They don't prevent you from going to sleep before takeoff or
landing, and that's at least as difficult a context switch.

~~~
mcpherrinm
At least in Canada, you're only allowed to have headphones on if they're
earbuds (easy to quickly remove) and connected to the in-flight sound system
(so you still hear announcements). I haven't paid attention to the onboard
safety dance in ages, so I don't recall what it is elsewhere.

~~~
alexeisadeski3
Justification being that earbuds don't get in the way as much as headphones.

There is literally no end to the inanity of bureaucracy.

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monkey_slap
All of these rules usually drive me crazy. I'm a private pilot and I'll take
up friends and coworkers for fun all the time. The most common question before
we take off is "Do I need to turn off my phone?" which I usually reply with "I
leave mine on for backup GPS". I do understand the need to stow away items to
prevent injuries if anything were to suddenly happen during takeoff and
landing, but telling people to turn off their devices because, and I've heard
this before, "they will interfere with the navigation systems" is just false.

~~~
dchichkov
All these rules are there for a reason. I completely agree with you that it is
perfectly all right to leave electronics on when you are giving rides. Even in
the very unlikely chance that a device that your friend has is faulty, and by
some wild chance it self-excited at an entirely wrong frequency and started
transmitting wildly at CTAF, so what... It is a perfect day, and you'll land
no problem.

But airline pilots are routinely flying IMC. They do want their radio aids
working. And there is just no knowing what faulty device of some shady
manufacturing one of these five hundred passengers is using. Who knows. May as
well " interfere with the navigation systems" at a wrong moment.

~~~
ubernostrum
_And there is just no knowing what faulty device of some shady manufacturing
one of these five hundred passengers is using._

Except that faulty device is already on the plane, and the lowest estimate
seems to be there's about a 1-in-3 chance it's powered on already, despite
regulations saying it needs to be off.

As many people are at pains to point out, if there were sufficient risk to
justify action, then we would not be needing to have a debate and point to
anecdotes (of which there are some in this discussion) from commercial pilots
who once experienced an equipment problem and said "well, I heard maybe a cell
phone could cause that". We would know beyond question that something's up
from the corresponding number of serious incidents.

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crusso
I will be beyond happy to be able to listen to my own music, read off my iPad,
and just begin the whole process of ignoring the goings-on in the flight.
Travel will be so much better without the useless electronics rules.

Now to get rid of the TSA...

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wfunction
Isn't this mainly an FCC restriction? [1]

I thought the main idea was to prevent phones from constantly jumping between
towers... does the FAA have much to do with this in reality?

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_on_aircraft](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_on_aircraft)

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
>I thought

See, it is one of the problems caused when authorities lie to people.

>the main idea was to prevent phones from constantly jumping between towers.

Cell tower interference is the only reason that's ever been offered that even
passes the giggle test, but even the FCC now is telling the FAA to ease up on
the silly rules.

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wyager
Good. These rules are ridiculous and not founded in reality. No consumer
communication device is going to cause harmful interference with avionics or
communications equipment, especially in modern planes with double redundancy
and heavy shielding. These rules, just like many others, are rooted in nothing
more than tradition and superstition.

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changdizzle
long overdue, everytime i fly i probably see 50% of the people NOT turning off
their phones. even more painful is seeing the flight attendant try to actually
explain why people need to shut off their devices

~~~
jlgreco
Yeah, I understand the logic behind _" The FCC/FAA cannot test every single
device for airplane use"_ but as far as I can tell so many people ignore this
rule that if it really were a problem, airplanes would be dropping out of the
sky like bricks every day. Many, if not most, people ignore the rule, so it
probably isn't a big deal in reality.

~~~
ihsw
The issue is when shit hits the fan then will you be able to depend on
communications with air traffic control? Other people will be reaching for
their phones at the same time, surely radio congestion is a real concern.

Or it used to be.

~~~
jlgreco
I strongly suspect that cellphone networks falling over because too many
people are trying to call their families are not going to stop a pilot from
talking with air traffic control. Maybe I'm wrong there, but I really don't
think I am.

Regardless, that is what 'airplane mode' is for. Having the device on but not
the radio isn't really about that.

~~~
ihsw
Maybe the airlines/the FAA found out how to turn airplane mode on remotely.

~~~
jlgreco
I doubt they would dare. That would impact first responders as well.

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nly
Strange. I thought the reason for shutting off your phone was so you were more
likely to pay attention to wtf is going on. You know, for safety procedures
etc.

~~~
crdoconnor
They never bother you if you're reading the inflight magazine though.

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zippergz
When I've been lucky enough to fly private, they have not once said a peep
about turning off my phone, which I'm sure they would have if they were
legitimately concerned about safety. Of course, the service doesn't work at
altitude, so I tend to put it in airplane mode anyway just to avoid the
battery drain of it constantly searching for a signal.

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mcescalante
I'm glad this is finally happening. I have had a number of very poor
experiences with flight attendants just because they think that something I've
got is turned on. Most of them demand to see the unplugged end of my earbuds
if I'm ever wearing them, or stay to watch me power something down.

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
Tell them you have unbearable anxiety during takeoff, and are liable to have
another panic attack / projectile vomiting / crap yourself incident. If they
want us to suffer their lies, they may as well suffer ours.

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melling
Well, playing Words with Friends is still not allowed. Of course, that becomes
next to impossible to prevent. I'm not sure why the transmitters need to be
disable because in reality many won't be.

~~~
snom380
They want as many transmitters as possible off to reduce the _chance_ of
interference. With in-flight Wifi and picocells it will be possible to have
everyone connected without having lots of cell phones trying to connect to
base stations far away using high power.

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obiefernandez
News like this makes me think there's a sliver of hope for America. (Then
again the article makes it sound like they'll still want you to put your phone
into airplane mode.)

~~~
Filligree
Switching it to airplane mode makes sense, though.

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zw123456
Not long ago, there was a piece on the local news about a big lightning storm
and how a plane was hit by lightning and they had a guy on from the FAA saying
how it is nothing to worry about and that planes are designed such that a
lightning strike would not harm it. So, if I am to understanding this
correctly... A commercial airliner is in danger from my phone with a 3.7V
battery but a million volt lightning strike will not harm anything? hmmmm,
that does not add up, sorry. About time they drop this obviously ridiculous
rule. Now please, the shoes off at the airport, come on.

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darkarmani
I thought airplane mode was used for the entire flight. Does anyone turn their
iphone completely off for takeoff?? or their macbook for that matter?

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zmk_
Wow, this is so much more prohibitive than what we have in Europe. I can not
remember being asked to switch my phone off it had an airplane mode.

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auctiontheory
Does putting my iPhone into "Airplane Mode" automagically disable the NSA
bugging processes?

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rossjudson
This is a bad decision by the FAA. Do you know the most dangerous phase of
flight? It's takeoff. The next most dangerous phase? Landing. It's a good idea
to have everyone put their devices away for the first and last five minutes of
the flight -- just in case quick action is required by passengers who, without
headphone cords and loud entertainment, stand a better chance of following
instructions.

A drunken asshole on a plane is irritating. A cell-wielding drunken asshole on
a plane is unbearable.

