Mobile phone calls on planes within months

The Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | September 8, 2007 | David Millward

[Stoat]

Mobile phone calls on planes within months

By David Millward, Transport Editor Last Updated: 12:01am BST 08/09/2007

 

Airline passengers could be able to use mobile phones on aircraft within months.

• Join our campaign for mobile-free flights

  Industry safety regulators have always banned their use on board because of fears the signal would interfere with the plane's electronic and communications equipment.

  But new technology has been developed which means that passengers will be able to make phone calls on mobile handsets safely while in flight.

  This week Ryanair started trials intended to prove phones can be used on the Boeing 737, which is used for millions of short-haul flights a year. If successful, the no-frills carrier expects to be able to offer the facility to make calls on most of its planes by December next year. Other airlines are likely to follow suit. Air France is expected to be the first to make the service available later this year.

  But the industry is split between those who believe passengers will welcome the change and those who think they will regard it as an intrusion.

  The technology has to be approved by the European Aviation Safety Agency as well as other global safety regulators.

  If approval is given it will be possible to use phones above 10,000 feet - the altitude which is where computers and other electronic devices can currently be switched on.

  According to industry sources, call charges would be in line with those charged when roaming abroad, roughly 50 pence a minute. Underpinning the possibility of using a phone or email device on board is the invention of a small telephone mast, about the size of a dinner plate.

  It means that the phone signal is weak enough not to interfere with other equipment on the plane, but once boosted by the mini-mast, strong enough to make a call. Until the breakthrough the phone signal was too strong because it was seeking the nearest mast, normally on the ground more than 30,000ft below.

  The trials come against the backdrop of a Daily Telegraph campaign to keep phones off planes, which many regard as the last sanctuary of peace and quiet.

[Stoat]

The trials come against the backdrop of a Daily Telegraph campaign to keep phones off planes, which many regard as the last sanctuary of peace and quiet.

Perhaps for people who fly First Class it is indeed peaceful, but for the rest of us who are subjected to the sound of babies screaming while their parents smile and continue chatting away unperturbed, in a closed environment where one cannot leave, it is in many cases far less than a 'sanctuary of peace and quiet'.  Regardless of the Telegraph's campaign, if this is proven to be safe then it's going to happen.  We can't even seem to get people to turn off their phones in the movie theaters on the ground....expecting telephone courtesy from others while on a plane, where people are jammed into tiny seats and have a tough time getting out of their seats to visit the restroom much less to make what should be a private telephone call will be an expectation that won't be met.

[gondramB]

I can see requiring a silent mode but more and more mobile phones are used for email, texting, reading documents, getting news,It doesn’t make sense to ban them on planes.

Not mention why even require them to be silent if back of the seat air to ground phones are allowed instead?

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

This is a huge surprise to me because I have flown commercial since 1960 and you could always make a phone call from an airplane.

[isom35]

“signal would interfere with the plane’s electronic and communications equipment” any evidence of this happening on 9/11?

[paul51]

As if air travel isn’t a big enough pain now. Having to listen to some inconsiderate fool yelling into his cell phone all the way across the country only adds to the torture.

[Stoat]

As if air travel isn’t a big enough pain now. Having to listen to some inconsiderate fool yelling into his cell phone all the way across the country only adds to the torture.

Agreed.  I think that we've identified another reason to rediscover The Great American Superhighway

 

 

[Stoat]

“signal would interfere with the plane’s electronic and communications equipment” any evidence of this happening on 9/11?

None that I'm aware of.

[ran20]

I’ll look for a plane that doesnt’ allow cell phone calls onboard.. or at least has a large section without them.

I don’t even own a cell phone, as I don’t want people calling me all the time. They can leave me a message if its important.

England ran a global empire before there even was telephones. With a lot less bureaucracy then we have today. Actually if you can’t stay in constant communication back and forth you can’t have much bureaucracy. You give general instructions in letters.. and you decentralize decision making, budgetary authority, freedom of action etc..

I talk to friends who are flying to meetings weekly, some of those meetings have 30 people in the meeting. Then they all try to come to consensus on a decision. These are decisions I’d take 10 minutes and make the decision myself. And naturally the morons are constantly talking on their phone to each other, trying to get opinions of everyone and ‘convince’ the others. We get the pleasure of hearing those conversations.

[gondramB]

From the first episode of West Wing

Toby: This is a Lockheed eagle series L-1011. It came off the line 20 months ago and carries a Sim-5 Transponder tracking system. Are you telling me I can still flummox this thing with something I bought at Radio Shack?
Flight Attendant: You can make your call when we land, sir.
Toby: Also, I never got my peanuts.

[WoofDog123]

the classic is the guy who speaks so loud that you hear him 40 feet away. Have run into him a few times in restaurants, guess will have to resort to open rudeness to ask him to lower his mouth volume in the future.

[Tabi Katz]

I had to double- and triple- check the date on this article. I remember phones on planes at least as far back as 10 years ago (and even then I realized they were nothing new). Granted, they weren’t personal phones, but maybe someone with more technological savvy than myself can explain how the impact on safety is any different.

[AntiKev]

No. Doesn’t happen. Can’t happen. The interference thing was always a cover. Mobiles operate on different frequencies from the electronics in an airplane and in any case would not cause a life-threatening situation. Navigation using radio aids is all but extinct, everyone is flying with GPS now, using the radio aids as backups.

As long as you’re within range of a tower, you can use your mobile. What they’re talking about here is turning the airplanes into mobile cell towers. Generally cell phones will work to a few thousand feet, but you’re moving too quick and the phone can’t keep up with the switching of towers and networks. You would have to find a tower and orbit it at about 2000 feet or lower to be able to have a conversation without it dropping out.

[tyke]

No one used those built-in phones, they were a flop. None of the new planes have them anymore (that I ever noticed, anyway).

I swear, though, if phones are ever allowed, then if the passenger next to me carries on long, loud conversations on a cell phone for more than a couple of minutes, I’m going to start talking to them in a very loud voice until they stop.

And it’s going to happen. You only have to watch people today in airports waiting for their flight. They will spend hours on the phone to anyone who will listen to them, to the point where they end up hogging all the power outlets because they drain their batteries.

[paul51]

Got stuck sitting on the tarmac at JFK for several hours a few weeks ago. Yep, cell phones are ok in such a situation. The jerk next to me was going on and on. As a general rule, I’ve learned that if you have to ask, it’s a waste of time. In this case, I couldn’t help myself. I finally asked him if his battery was going to run out anytime soon. I suppose he got the message because he finally put it away shortly after.

[WoofDog123]

“The jerk next to me was going on and on. As a general rule, I’ve learned that if you have to ask, it’s a waste of time. In this case, I couldn’t help myself. I finally asked him if his battery was going to run out anytime soon. I suppose he got the message because he finally put it away shortly after.”

Your tact is admirable...I will remember this oblique approach to the topic of cell phone termination when it arises.....

[Stoat]

I swear, though, if phones are ever allowed, then if the passenger next to me carries on long, loud conversations on a cell phone for more than a couple of minutes, I’m going to start talking to them in a very loud voice until they stop.

And to think of the "air rage" events that are so common now with drunks and various idiots....wait until that drunk has a cellphone in his hand and he's yelling at his ex-wife all the way to Australia or Japan or wherever for 18 hours....you'll have gangs of passengers wanting to beat these people to death over the Pacific.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Mythbusters had a show about cell phones changing the electronics used for navigation on an airplane and could not get a cell phone to to change any readings.

[Stoat]

Strange, I just tried the article’s main hyperlnk and it took me to the main page of the Telegraph Travel section rather than to this article.

I found the correct page and here is the link for it, just in case anyone else has that problem :-)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/main.jhtml?xml=/travel/2007/09/08/et-mobile108.xml

[Proud_texan]

"I’m going to start talking to them"

Here's a fun thought; talk outloud to yourself about "the voices" and see how much empty space you can create around yourself.

[JennysCool]

Making Americans think they NEED cellphones 24/7 is one of the great marketing coups of the century.