Sunday, March 19, 2006

Poll: Inflight Cell Phone Use

The FAA, and individual airlines, are considering allowing cell phone use once the flight is air born.  Regulations would still prohibit use below 10,000 feet, the time when personal electronic devices would most likely be able to cause interference with aircraft navigation aids.
 
What do you think of this idea?  Would you use your cell phone in flight?  Would you want to sit next to someone who was on their phone?  Vote in the new poll, and leave your comments here.
 
 

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Since "smoking or non" is no longer asked, we could replace it with "yammering or non". Talking on the phone for more than one minute is permitted only in the yammering part of the plane. (Text messaging would be permitted in the non-yammering section though.)

Fly Girl said...

I love it!

Anonymous said...

I find it quite hard to believe that you'd be able to get adequate reception 35,000 feet up. I mean, that's 6.6 miles up (10KM), in a large metal tube, hurtling along at 900KM an hour. I dunno, is it just me that thinks you'd be lucky to be able to hold a link with a terrestrial base station?

Anonymous said...

I don't have a problem with allowing texting and blackberry emailing, but I'll bet most airlines would still ban cellphone conversations.

Anonymous said...

That is going to be worse than have babies crying (btw: I am sometimes the one carrying the baby) on board. It will definitely bother a lot of the passengers, especially when some would be insensitive enough to gab on the phone while everyone else is trying to get a shut eye.

Anonymous said...

Geeze louise...What did these people used to do when cell phones were not even around? Seriously folks...Is it really going to kill you to not have a telephone conversation for the length of your flight? Most of you should be appreciative of the fact that your annoying partner or demanding boss can't get a hold of you...it's your 'me' time...peace and quiet...time to relax and forget about the day to day.
In all seriousness, the use of cell phones would be a horrible decision. Yesterday I had these two ladies in row 1 who would not shut up (not even during my safety announcement (thank god we didn't have an emergency!)). Not only would they not shut up but they couldn't talk quietly either. Besides the fact the I was annoyed by their rude behaviour...so was every other passenger around them. Can you imagine if they were each on cellphones?!?! CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?
*LOL...The man behind them in row 2 kept rolling his eyes the entire flight...obviously annoyed by their loud and constant 'yacking'. When he was exiting the a/c I leaned into his ear and said..."I'm sorry about your bad experience...just be glad your not married to one of them!" He started laughing and said, If I was married to one of them I'd be in prison! :)

Fly Girl said...

Dan: I won't pretend to understand the technology. I know that I have turned my phone on to see if I can get a signal when we're airborne, and I never can. On the other hand, it seems like on the 9/11 flights, lots of people could. I don't know how it will actually work.

Omis: I'm with you. I don't have a problem with texting. Actually, I don't have a problem with anything that's quiet. It's the noise level that has me concerned.

Melissa: I think we can pretty much count on people being insensitive, or oblivious, to how their gabbing is effecting those around them. We already see that happening in other public places, so I doubt the airplane will be any different.

Flygirl: I've been known to say to people (who are trying to talk louder over our safety announcement) ssssshhhhh, it's our turn to talk now.

Anonymous said...

Obviously safety concerns are an issue. However, I confess that what would matter more to me would be sitting next to someone (or worse, between people) talking non-stop on their cell phones. And, it seems, that the ones who are worst about talking everywhere (bus, airport, restaurant, grocery store, etc) are also the LOUDEST talkers. It would be absolutely misserable to be trapped between two such people. The only thing worse would be to be trapped between two such people who were grossly overweight (spilling into my seat), and had bad body odor.
You can tell that I've had a few bad flight experiences!)