FAA To Reevaluate Inflight Electronic Device Use 336
coondoggie writes "If you have been on a commercial airline, the phrase 'The use of any portable electronic equipment while the aircraft is taxiing, during takeoff and climb, or during approach and landing,' is as ubiquitous but not quite as tedious as 'make sure your tray tables are in the secure locked upright position.' But the electronic equipment restrictions may change. The Federal Aviation Administration today said it was forming a government-industry group to study the current portable electronic device use policies commercial aviation use to determine when these devices can be used safely during flight."
Considering I fly multiple times a month (Score:5, Insightful)
with half a dozen mobile devices, or more - and most of them are on w/ cell signal while I'm flying...
They really should review that policy.
Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm ok with the FAA loosening up on those poor, persecuted, electromagnetic waves that have historically been singled out for persecution and discrimination.
However, I would like to see the draconian measures previously reserved for in-flight electronics applied with redoubled fury against those who have the temerity to emit high volume and/or pitch sound waves, or substantial levels of visible-range electromagnetic radiation during nighttime hours. Those are the true hazard to consumer aviation.
Permit wifi and crack down on screaming children.
Ongoing Experiments (Score:5, Insightful)
I would bet that more than 50% of devices on planes are already left on for takeoff and landing. The only thing being turned off is the screen.
Re:Are these devices that important? (Score:4, Insightful)
What's the big deal?
Its mostly fear mongering FUD. We aren't exactly suffering from a lack of it. I'm sure we'll invent a new reason.
Another is what amounts to electrical smog makes it irrelevant over the developed world. Yeah, sure, from a EE perspective a microwatt level kindle is a big problem compared to a 100 kilowatt class TV transmitter.
The other thing is assuming you believe in the terrorist behind every tree stump mythos, the problem is intentional radiators are available at power levels 60 to 90 dB higher than your average unintentional radiator. So if you want a chance in hell of operating flight instruments thru an "attack" by someone with a hand held radio transmitter, you are inherently utterly impervious to the 90 dB down levels of any pacifistic consumer device.
I would like to see a new procedure for flying replacing the FUD with a genuine interference FAA and TSA reported emergency light and procedure. So in the infinitely unlikely event someone intentionally or unintentionally caused a problem, they'd track it. Not just untracked voodoo like now "well, we don't know why, but the VOR rx was acting up so we assume it must have been passenger electronics"
Re:Are these devices that important? (Score:5, Insightful)
I used to travel for a living and I couldn't begin to tell you how many times I saw people leave their portable electronic devices on. Whether this was an accident or not I couldn't tell you of course, but I would have to imagine that if you were extrapolate a dozen cell phones a flight by a couple thousand flights a day etc.....
Point being that there is overwhelming real world evidence that portable electronic devices just don't bring airliners. If that was actually the case we would have had airliners falling out of the sky on a daily basis every day for many years now. The rules for turning the devices off have no basis in reality and are as outdated as the manual typewriter. They need overturned and left in the dustbin of history...
Re:Oh please no (Score:5, Insightful)
Not this again. This has been discussed to death. If they do not ask people to put away regular books, why should I be asked to put away my ebook reader. Either make a consistent rule that one should put away any sort of distraction away, for the sake of situation awareness or dont prohibit anything.
Re:$$$ Won't let this happen... (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think they'll reduce the restrictions much, if at all. If it were truly a case about interference and radio waves, then why do they have phones on the planes, tv's built into every head rest, and large tv's in front of the isles? All of those electronics are just fine to use whenever because you have to pay for them. If they start letting us use all of our own stuff up there then that'll be less profit.
There are multiple issues here. First off, the issue is about crowd control. THEY control all the on-board electronics, and can turn them off at whim. This way, they can always ensure they have the attention of passengers, and can disable any malfunctioning electronics equipment.
Second, they have phones on the planes that are air-to-land or air-to-satellite linked, through a single antenna. The phone systems are shielded. Compare this to cellular phones, which ramp up signal strength depending on how far they are from the nearest cell. Plus, cell phones aren't meant to be used at those speeds; during takeoff and landing, the plane is close to the ground, but moving fast -- meaning constant hop from cell to cell, requiring signal boost from both the towers and the phones, potentially interrupting navigational equipment (the disruption would be just as much from the ground cells as from the phones).
This brings us to the third point: flight attendants are not EM experts, nor can they identify every electronic gadget made in the past 20 years at a glance. Much easier to have a blanket ban on devices than to have to figure out what sort of radio each device has inside, and what sort of potential EM output the device has.
So, the FAA has approved a few airline-controlled methods of communication and entertainment, and banned everything else.
Personally, I've always wondered why they seem to allow paperbacks, magazines and newspapers during takeoff and landing, even though they tell people to stow all their loose belongings.
Re:What could possibly go wrong? (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, because terrorists would not attack anything were there laws prohibiting such attacks, ergo they would obey the electronics restrictions were they in place. The ONLY thing stopping them right now is not the fear of being killed by legitimate passengers, but the silly restriction against using electronics which CAN NOT and DO NOT interfere with properly-installed-and-maintained avionics.
Re:Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
Permit wifi and crack down on screaming children.
We all hate screaming children, especially those of us who fly with them.
What we hate even more are clueless assholes who don't have children telling us what rotten people we are because our three year old lost patience during the last hour of a 6 hour flight delayed two hours.
Re:Are these devices that important? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Are these devices that important? (Score:5, Insightful)
I fly all the time and have never once been asked to stow a book, including one I am actively reading.
Furthermore, they require the devices be OFF rather than simply stowed. If my phone is turned off and I can demonstrate it, they don't care if it's sitting in my hands and I'm playing with it, ineffectually pressing buttons and making wooshing sounds as I fly it around my immediate airspace. I say this from first-hand experience.
Which by process of elimination leaves...d) outdated paranoia?
Re:Considering I fly multiple times a month (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, since as soon as you land you are free to use your phone (and many people do), I think your faraday cage does not do what you think it does.
Re:Are these devices that important? (Score:5, Insightful)
There's nothing special about the first 10 and last 10 minutes of a flight, other than it's the most likely time for a plane to crash land.
Well, you must be right. The last ten minutes of a flight will always have the highest incidence of crashes, since every flight that crashes has a last ten minutes. Except those that crash in the first ten.
But you're wrong in that the first and last ten minutes are not special. The first and last ten minutes of a normal flight are when the aircraft passes through the same airspace where all the VFR and IFR general aviation aircraft are, and are in the viscinity of an active airport where air traffic tends to congregate for some unknown reason. Getting above 10,000' means you've left most of the small private fleet behind, and once you hit 18,000' you're into IFR-only O2-carrying airspace (Class A), and that limits the amount of traffic even more. In bad weather, at either end of the flight, they need to concentrate on flying prescribed flight path so they don't run into anyone else, or into a big rock or whatever other hazard they need to avoid.
So you are actually wrong, the first and last ten are critical times in the flight profile, not just for those planes that are headed for a crash. That's why there is something called "sterile cockpit rules", where flight crews are prohibited from random chatter during important phases of the flight (like takeoff and landing).
In between, the workload is lighter and the pilots have a bit of time to deal with problems that crop up without them being a serious danger just by being a distraction. There is a common saying about flying, that a flight is "ten minutes of panic punctuated by hours of bordom in between." Or something like that.
The regulation is all about causing passengers to pay attention to flight attendants and nothing to do with avionics.
You are absurdly incorrect. The flight attendants don't need to include any instructions about electronic devices in order to need your attention to the briefing, it is a FEDERAL LAW that they give you that briefing and that it covers certain material. Those briefings aren't going to go away if the FAA and FCC change the rules about being able to use your cellphone during flight.
Re:Well... (Score:1, Insightful)
You seem to be confused about the problem.
The problem isn't that your 3-year-old lost patience at the end of a 6-hour flight.
The problem is that you put a 3-year-old on a 6-hour-flight.
Which does, indeed, make you a rotten person.
Leave 3-year-old home with babysitter or drive.
Re:Oh please no (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes but you have to look at it from the point of view of the cabin crew. They can't take the time to evaluate every single piece of electronic equipment passengers want to use during the flight to make sure that none of them are transmitting. God, look how long it takes everyone just to stow their bags and sit their asses down in their seats. Now imagine the cabin crew having to check everyone's devices individually as well. The plane would never take off. So its easier to use the blanket statement of "No electronic devices during take off and landing". Honestly, is it really that fucking hard to not fiddle with your gps, or phone, or kindle, or tablet, or ipad, or whatever for a few minutes? Read the damn sky mall magazine for fuck's sake.
Always been a red herring (Score:5, Insightful)
This ban on wireless has always been a red herring. Mobile devices typically operate at a couple of watts, tops. Meanwhile, while taking off or landing, a plane is going to pass fairly close to many cell towers, each of which is belting out much more powerful, much more continuous signals.
And nothing happens.
Planes are also hit with radar from ATC, MET, TCAS, and more, plus massive signals from broadcast media. All the time.
And nothing happens.
Banning this stuff was partly out of what-if fears, and partly because it was an area where the agency and airlines could impose their control upon the public. They really and truly get off on being able to tell us to stand there, do this, don't do that, don't bring water, don't use your phone, don't use your GPS, don't use your laptop, and so on, with "it's against the law" as justification 1, "it's policy" as justification 2 and "We'll arrest you sucka!" as justification 3, and finally to sum up them all: "OMG the plane might crash!"
Re:Mythbusters? (Score:3, Insightful)
Because Mythbusters is a shining example for accurate and effective testing through the use of the scientific process.
Mythbusters is to science as pro wrestling is to sport.
Re:Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
We all hate screaming children, especially those of us who fly with them.
Benadryl. Seriously. Yeah, yeah, it seems terrible to "drug your child"... but it's safe stuff that you give them many times for many other reasons (fevers and whatnot), and it will not only make the flight more pleasant for you and your neighbors, but for your child as well. Don't overdo it, just a normal dose will make the child sleepy enough to overcome the strangeness of the environment -- which is what is keeping the tired kid from going to sleep anyway -- and let him nod off.