Device Drama
This is why you should listen to your flight attendant. Don’t be the one guy who thinks the rules don’t apply to him. You’re toying with hundreds of lives just so you can play Angry Birds!
Optipess
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Bullshit! The government guy in black told me that it makes satelites drop, not planes!
Read that there’s no evidence about that.
What happens to flights with WiFi? =P
WiFi uses a different frequency band. Typical Cell phones use 800-2000 MHz signals (varies a lot by country), while WiFi uses frequencies around 2400 MHz.
But that is not really the main problem in commercial flights. The problem is that most flight instruments (notably the ILS that allows planes to land with ZERO visibility) are analog systems. To an analog system, all other signals, even in different frequencies, are noise and produce an error. Imagine trying to land an airplane and your instruments saying the runway is thirty meters to the left of where it actually is. Now imagine that happening when the pilot has zero visibility. That is why, even in flights with WiFi service, the service is shut down during landings and take-off.
Outside of landings and take-offs, the use of cell phones is not really problematic (even though there really is no point in connecting your phone up there, as you will not be in range of any tower). Even if it confuses some onboard systems (which is unlikely, as they are shielded), there is plenty of redundancy and time to correct the error, but during landings and take-offs, it is a big (and unnecessary) risk.
Truth of the matter is, there was never any problem with running electronic devices in flight. The general ban on electronic devices is based on the phenomenally low possibility that there could *potentially* be interference in navigation and guidance systems.
Electronics are already shielded aboard aircraft in order to protect them from solar radiation during high-altitude flight — a dinky little cell phone in the capacity of a jammer is about as effective as an extremist running into Gaza Strip with a fly swatter. Anecdotally there is occasional instances of GPS receivers losing signal under IFR due to the presence of a certain make of cellphones on board, but in a worst case scenario all this would mean is a wave-off and another pass. Worst case of the worst case scenario it would only mean the difference between a slightly bouncy landing and a perfect landing: there is no conceivable instance where a cell phone could cripple an aircraft or naval navigation system.
There’s still a reason not to use a cell phone in flight, aside from the laws telling you not to: your phone will drop calls frequently, assuming it can get a good signal at all, as it will rapidly switch towers. So given that there’s no point, why bother trying?
As for wi-fi, there’s actually another explanation for that. Cell phones operate on their carriers’ frequencies, which are not approved by the FAA, but wi-fi uses only a short range low-power radio signal for transmission to/from the aircraft’s router on the standard wi-fi frequencies (2.4 GHz 802.11b/n/g/etc.), and the router uses only an approved frequency for air-to-ground transmissions.
No seatbelts?