Cellphone use

tony roberts wrote:
It is an FCC rule because cellphone tower are designed to
pick up a limited number of calls and at altitude the towers
are over-loaded.

I don't understand this.
Consider that many new headsets actually have a cellphone interface.

and consider that here in Canada it is not illegal, and I use mine lots
- plugged right into my headset.
I don't understand how it could be legal here if it really did overload
towers. So what is the REAL reason?

Hmmmm . . . the plot thickens


I have heard that the real reason is that the towers are overloaded -

- with handovers.

The call has to be handed from tower to tower as the user
moves. The system was designed to cope
with walkers, people in cars, but not jets at 600mph.

I have no idea if the above is really true but it does make
some sort of sense to me.

On a related but unrelated topic -

One of the mysteries of life is that you can be in say London,
turn off a mobile phone, put it in a bag and go to Sydney.
When you get there you turn the phone on and if a few seconds later
your boss in Moscow calls you the call can be successfully routed
and your phone rings.

"Judah" wrote in message
. ..
tony roberts wrote in
news:indiacharlieecho-
15CF69.22341329122006@shawnews:



I haven't seen it myself, but I was told that there was a "MythBusters"
episode where the guys demonstrated that certain cell phones interfere
with
the ILS, causing the needle to deflect at least 50' to one side of the
runway.

I did see it. First, you have MUST keep in mind that the experiment,
while planned and controlled, was NOT realistic and the results were
inconclusive.
With that said, the receivers were cobbled together from off-the-shelf
from used avionics components. The system, under "normal" operation, with a
"normal" cell-phone did nothing to the glide slope or OBS. It was only when
the cobbled-up ILS was subjected to boosted energy on the cell-phone
frequency that some deviation occurred.
Note that the experiment ended up with a BUSTED! conclusion and caveats
from Jamie that the Mythbusters proved nothing.

"N2310D" wrote in news:%XEbh.17633$Uz.2268@trnddc05:

I did see it. First, you have MUST keep in mind that the
experiment, while planned and controlled, was NOT realistic and the
results were inconclusive.
With that said, the receivers were cobbled together from
off-the-shelf from used avionics components. The system, under
"normal" operation, with a "normal" cell-phone did nothing to the
glide slope or OBS. It was only when the cobbled-up ILS was
subjected to boosted energy on the cell-phone frequency that some
deviation occurred.
Note that the experiment ended up with a BUSTED! conclusion and
caveats from Jamie that the Mythbusters proved nothing.

Like I said, I hadn't seen the details.

I will say this - I used to have a Nextel phone with the walkie-talkie.
That thing interfered with everything from Computer Monitors to Doctor's
Office PA Systems. I have a Verizon phone now that is pretty benign, but I
never left that Nextel on when I was IFR - it wasn't worth the risk...

At the same time, the Nextel interfered with stuff that was at most 3'
away from me. In the pilot's seat, I could see a potential risk. I can't
imagine if I was sitting in the 1st row of a 737, let alone the 17th row,
anything I'm carrying will interfere with the GPS in the cockpit past the
galley, the toilet, the entry doors, and the piece of cardboard with the
metal bar they call a cabin door... I'm still pretty convinced that this
is at best a case of overprotection by the FAA to prevent risk from an
unknown (who knows what frequencies the phone companies will start
offerring service on?) and more likely a case of maintaining an outdated
rule because it allows Flight Attendents to do their briefing without
having to talk over a plane full of people on their cell phones...

Not much different than the "Seatbacks Upright" thing. Do you really think
it is a critical safety hazard that if the crew needs to evacuate the
passengers, the average person won't be able to navigate their way past
the 2" tilt of the seat in front of them. It rights itself when you push
it up...

Do you really think
it is a critical safety hazard that if the crew needs to evacuate the
passengers, the average person won't be able to navigate their way past
the 2" tilt of the seat in front of them. It rights itself when you push
it up...

Not with a 200 pound oaf asleep in the seat.

Jose
--
"There are 3 secrets to the perfect landing. Unfortunately, nobody knows
what they are." - (mike).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

Do you really think
it is a critical safety hazard that if the crew needs to evacuate the
passengers, the average person won't be able to navigate their way past
the 2" tilt of the seat in front of them. It rights itself when you push
it up...

It's not navigating after the plane is stopped that they are worrying
about, it's the crash.

Mxsmanic wrote:
The FAA allows airlines and pilots (of GA aircraft) to ban the use of
electronic devices that may interfere with the safety of the flight,
but it doesn't specifically forbid or allow individual items, with a
handful of exceptions. It's up to the operator or pilot to decide. [..]

I was reading through ASRS pages a few years ago, and there was a
special report listing cellphone related entries. You can probably
Google it up. Pilots would note navigation equipment going wacky when
a passenger used their phone.

There was one particular report that stuck in my mind. It was a
flight trying to use the autoland feature in almost zero visibility
conditions. They reported that each time they got close to the ground
the autopilot would go wacky and try to drop them in. They aborted
landing twice and finally the copilot went back to the first-class
section (I think 747 upper deck) and noticed that a lady was trying to
call her friends each time to say they were landing! He made her turn
the phone off and they landed okay on the third try.

Of course, it could be coincidence. But from the reports, a lot of
pilots just don't like taking the chance when things are a little
tight.

Kev

Newps wrote in
:

Do you really think
it is a critical safety hazard that if the crew needs to evacuate the
passengers, the average person won't be able to navigate their way
past the 2" tilt of the seat in front of them. It rights itself when
you push it up...

It's not navigating after the plane is stopped that they are worrying
about, it's the crash.

So in other words, if the plane goes slamming into the ground at 150 Knots
(at least), the 2 extra inches of foam seat in my face is going to make
the difference between life or death?

From

http://www.airsafe.com/events/models/b737.htm

"29 October 2006; ADC 737-200; Abuja, Nigeria: The aircraft crashed
shortly after takeoff on a scheduled domestic flight from Abuja to Sokoto.
There was a storm in the area at the time of the crash. Initial reports
indicate that there were four survivors among the 110 passengers and
crew."

I guess the 106 people who died must have been sitting behind people who
didn't put their seat backs up...

Judah wrote:


"29 October 2006; ADC 737-200; Abuja, Nigeria: The aircraft crashed
shortly after takeoff on a scheduled domestic flight from Abuja to Sokoto.
There was a storm in the area at the time of the crash. Initial reports
indicate that there were four survivors among the 110 passengers and
crew."

I guess the 106 people who died must have been sitting behind people who
didn't put their seat backs up...




One does not logically follow from the other.

Newps wrote in
:

One does not logically follow from the other.

Hey - are you MX-ing me?

Judah wrote:
Newps wrote in
:


One does not logically follow from the other.


Hey - are you MX-ing me?






And an abbreviation was born...