Hamish & Andy on mobile phone use in aircraft
 

Wondering if anybody caught these guys on Fox last evening. Apparently they were on about being able to make calls for free from your phone on the aircraft, as the calls could not be traced and therefore charged by the telco.

Apart from the sheer silliness of the concept itself, there was this flight attendant (Emma?) who always kept her phone switched on during flights. She could'nt make any calls of course, but just kept it on for the heck of it. Talk about the lack of training nowadays.

Wonder if anyone with some technical knowledge (a sense of humour too) can organize a phone call to these guys, to set the record straight.

does'nt do a thing...................my two cents

Unfortunately, no free calls to phones that are 38k ft above the gnd.

For a call to work, it needs to go through a process. Part of the process is to go through a system that recognises the call which also sets the timers to billing.

All in all, if you make a call, you get billed. There is no way around it what so ever.

I can't believe you may have fallen for that.

Not much point ringing them after the point, it's done and dusted now.

Sorry but it definitely doesn't work.

As for the flight attendant that called and said she always leaves her phone on, very clever missy. She said she even tried to make calls when airborne. Dumb.

Mythbusters took this one on in Episode 60, first aired in the US 15 March 2006. Here's what happened.

1. Inside a Faraday cage, they blasted a simulated cockpit with mobile phone waves and managed to get the VOR to deflect when they hit the right frequency (800+ mhz), but it took a serious blast.

2. They took the simulated cockpit to the airport on the back of a truck and tried the same thing, but couldn't get the VOR to settle in the first place. An engineer said this was probably because the simulated cockpit didn't include any shielding.

3. The FAA in the US wouldn't even allow them to experiment in the air, so they got a Lear jet on the tarmac at the airport with a mobile phone wave generator blasting away in the back. No so much as one instrument in the Lear even flickered.

Conclusion: mobile phones do nothing to aircraft avionics because of the shielding. It was concluded that mobiles are banned because the FAA don't want to take any chances.

Myth busted.

Walrus

I'm not going to make any calls on whether mobiles affect instrumentation - to dumb to know anything about it. But we all know for certain that mobiles interfere with comms systems - you get that buzzing/beeping sound over the speaker as a call or txt comes through. I for one wouldn't want that to happen when I'm getting a "Go Around" instruction, or a TCAS RA, etc. A relatively small risk, but why not eliminate it?

I for one can't understand these people who can't be out of comms for more than 10 minutes or the World will fall apart. Get some perspective people. If you're that important, you should have a private jet - then you can do whatever you please.:rolleyes:

On the original question - I have heard that myth about the calls not able to be billed. The way I've heard it a number of times is that the only reason you can't use the phone airborne is that the airlines are protecting the telcos from being rorted - nothing to do with air safety. Just goes to show how people will believe any silly conspiracy theory if they feel their right to talk on a mobile 24/7 is being infringed.


Done. Next.

Exactly. When you spend 10's of 1000's of dollars on TSO'd avionics, and EMI testing to give you the level of reliability you require for operations, you don't want it all to be degraded by one person's $200 mobile phone trying to find a cell....

My thoughts exactly!
In Japan the use of mobile phones is prohibited on trains, mostly because it irritates everyone else... suprisingly 99% of people are able to respect this rule, and those who don't are very discrete about it.
End rant.

Rehashed again
 

We've been here before, http://www.pprune.org/forums/d-g-gen...nes-cabin.html

Also, here's some research info I found a while back relating to portable device incidents in AU.
Google Docs

Someone ought to bust Mythbusters. :ugh:

No matter how entertaining it might be, sensationalist opinion has no place in scientific enquiry.
Nor has poorly thought out "experiments" that are tunnelled to test a very narrow range of hypotheses that look good on TV.

Putting a mobile phone in the cockpit is NOT the same as having the same txr directly underneath an antenna or transmission cable.

Notwithstanding the insecurity of certain individuals who fret about "being out of contact" , the safe option is to ban the use of a medium that is NOT necessary for the safe conduct of the flight.

Personally, I delight in the time where I KNOW that I'm not going to be razzed by a goddam mobile phone:ok:

Just to confirm, no nail clippers, because they might be used to hijack the aircraft, therefore they'll be confiscated. But a mobile phone is OK, we trust you not to use it, carry on Sir and enjoy your flight?

A point I made before in the link from flog, but I have seen (several times) the VOR needle oscillating in time to the unmistakeable dat da dat from a mobile phone.

As in moving only when the dat da dat happened.

Phones can and do interfere (granted not every time).

Just turn them off... my favourite part of flying on an airliner is the knowledge that all the phones are turned off, or at least not within range of a signal. Probably the only place that happens these days.:ok:

Plenty of occasions of mobiles setting of the baggage smoke detector in the Dash.

So you can absolutely 100% guarantee that 100% of the sheilding on all aircraft is 100% perfect?

Sounds optimistic.

Even if it's only once, it's a big worry if that once, it unlocks the coupled autopilot on a down to minimums app.

999 999
 

I have noticed my 3G phone when airborne and turned on sometimes has the operator logo of 999 999 displayed instead of TELSTRA.

I believe the operator logo is downloaded when connected to the service, no service, no logo.

So ... who's service am I connected to when the phone displays 999 999.
The phone still works and calls can be made and received.

This is my own aircraft and me as PIC. Never noticed any discrepancies in any Nav or GPS operations.

What on earth did you do that for........:} You had a perfectly good experiment on your hands there and you ruined it!

J:E

I interrupted him and requested he fix the 45 degrees of bank the autopilot had simultaneously rolled in.

Lucky you were in the simulator then, otherwise the passengers would have been screaming.

I happened to be in the right seat of an SR22 fresh from the states for a test run a couple of years ago. The pilot had a plan in the GPS and slaved the autopilot to the GPS. He then fired up his mobile phone, hooked up his laptop and checked the weather at our destination. At the same time, he had the VOR tuned to the outbound radial. There was no fluctuation from the needle. He could easily have had the autopilot hooked to the NAV and there wouldn't have been a problem.

My point is that mobile phones continue to be used by GA pilots in flight with no detrimental effects on IFR navigation.

It is becoming obvious that neither side of this arguement can claim to know the definitive answer.

Walrus

Don't fall for that or it may prove very expensive for you. :uhoh:

Some years ago I used to fly all around Australia, I regularly used my mobile in flight as did everyone on the flightdeck.

When I got my first bill after starting to do this, at first I thought someone was ripping me off as I had never been to all these unusual places on my bill.

Then I realised it was the stations/masts whatever we were flying over when I was on the mobile.

Be careful, you will be billed................ :eek: