You Don’t Need to Use Airplane Mode on Airplanes | Airplane mode hasn’t been necessary for nearly 20 years, but the myth persists.::Airplane mode hasn’t been necessary for nearly 20 years, but the myth persists.
Shut up dumb bot. Who doesnt love airplane mode? Rare excuse to fuck off the grid for a couple hours. Also your battery will just get sucked dry if you forget to turn it on. We all know it’s not necessary from a safety standpoint but let’s keep the peace and maintain this cultural norm in the sake of sanity.
You shouldn’t risk it, because no one knows how planes work.
You should still set airplane mode when airborne for other reasons besides interference with the aircraft. For one, you’ll save your battery. It takes a lot of “juice” for your device to search for cell towers that are likely out of reach. You may also want to avoid connecting to a tower outside where you have coverage. E.g. for a flight from Anchorage to Minneapolis, maybe you don’t want to connect to Canadian cell towers and potentially receive charges in another country. Obviously this depends on your plan limits. But, yeah, it’s not really about protecting the airplane, in most cases
I thought another reason was to avoid blasting everyone you pass with your phone’s maximum power signal while trying to reconnect.
Microwave radiation from phones doesn’t pose any danger. The amount of energy that’s transmitted is completely negligible.
I don’t think even the combined power of all the phones in the plane would be enough to cause interference for anyone
The phone’s modem is not powerful enough, it takes a couple watts at most, which is tiiny compared to what a cell tower can output
Cell phone radiation is negligible
Most flights I’ve been on had outlets and/or USB for charging, I’ve been leaving airplane mode off for every flight for years now
Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure battery drain is about normal anyways when I don’t plug it in, the radio must eventually switch to a lower power lower search frequency at some point. Either that or the tower searching drains your battery thing is about as overblown as the leaving GPS on thing
I turn on airplane mode whenever I am already connected to wifi
Here is a video from TED-Ed that explains why. TLDR: phones looking for a signal broadcast on high power, but planes move so fast that you can end up right next to a cell tower so the high power signal can interfere with other phones trying to communicate.
I disagree with how he phrases a few things, but I think it’s mostly accurate.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) conducted a study in 2012 that found nearly zero conclusive instances of aircraft disturbances from cell phone usage.
Now keep in mind, federal law requires you to follow the aircraft crew’s instructions, which includes turning on airplane mode.
In 2013, the FCC got a new chairman, Tom Wheeler, who wanted to shake things up by enabling phone calls and data usage on flights.
“Allowing cellphones on planes sounds like the premise of a new reality show: ‘Cage Fighting at 30,000 Feet,’ ” said Oregon Rep. Greg Walden to the Washington Post at the time.
However, regulators and airlines pressured the FCC into keeping the rule in place, out of fear that in-flight phone calls would create chaos in the sky.
Nowadays, you can get wifi on almost any flight for a small fee, allowing you to make voice calls, surf the internet, and play video games.
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How hard is it for someone to go without their damn phone for a flight. Probably can’t connect to towers anyways when you’re up in the air. That business deal or meeting can wait. For once in your life just do what someone else asks of you before taking off and stop bitching. Or drive or take a train.
Yeah good plan, I’ll drive or take a plane across the ocean for my next vacation. Not every trip can be taken by land and many that can are extremely long and or slow.
Okay, heres the thing. You’re stuck in a giant tube in the sky for hours. I get people will be bored from lack of anything to do. Hell this post isn’t even about that. Its about how we keep clinging to old standards that made sense at the time that are honestly just kinda dumb now.
If I know I’ll be on a flight that’s longer than, say, 2 hours, I’ll make sure to bring enough entertainment (movies, TV games, books, downloaded internet articles, whatever) to last me the whole trip in case I can’t sleep.
Whoever is too dumb to do that should just suffer.
Very odd energy.
Why would it be more acceptable to talk on your phone on a train instead of a plane?
Nope. Why would it be. In Europe there’s specific wagons where talking on the phone is allowed, so the high-flyer corporate guys can do their thing while not annoying normal people.
Oh boy, who’s gonna tell this guy about in-flight WiFi?
Back in the day airlines would charge you a premium to call from the plane.
300+ cellphones suddenly hogging an antenna as they roam by may be inconvenient for the carrier. Can you actully get reception up so high even?
If cellphones really did interfere with airplanes, there would’ve been a lot of crashes because of it, there’s always a smart ass.
Every once in a while during a flight, I’ll get an email or a text gets through after a brief connection with a tower. That or my time zone will update based on the tower is connected to.
If airplane mode really mattered they wouldn’t let you even have a device
That’s asinine. It’s like saying “If brakes really mattered, a cop would check your brakes before letting you drive to work in the morning”. Brakes are pretty damn important, but very few places (in the US at least) have any mechanism for ensuring yours are in working order even periodically.
Proper risk mitigation takes into account (at minimum) the likelihood of an event occuring, the severity of the event occurring, your willingness to tolerate a failure, and the cost associated with implementing corrections.
Airlines have an EXTREMELY low tolerance for any kind of risk that could conceivably lead to a catastrophic failure, so the fact that you’re allowed to have a device, despite potential safety concerns, comes from a combination of a few factors:
- The chances of some kind of major interference with flight ops happening are demonstrably pretty low
- People would likely push back quite hard on not being able to use electronic devices for entertainment on a flight.
- Most people comply with the request.
- Related to 3, there is little reason for airlines to change the rule, since cell operation is next to impossible in flight anyways, and wifi/bluetooth are not in the frequency range of concern.
That’s asinine. It’s like saying “If brakes really mattered, a cop would check your brakes before letting you drive to work in the morning”
This argument is also asinine. Cops aren’t in your car. If your brakes fail it isn’t their problem. Cops don’t give a fuck about your safety.
The airline crew are in your plane. If there was actually a safety risk they would absolutely do something about it because it affects them personally.
The reality is there is no safety risk which is why they don’t do anything. If safety was actually reliant on people turn on airplane mode then we’d all be fucked.
Right, with that extremely low tolerance would come an extremely high bar of security.
For example, you can’t have lithium in the cargo, and can’t have compressed gas or knives in the cabin. And what do we see? They prohibit and screen for those things (to the best of their ability).
They wouldn’t let you have a knife if you promised to keep it in your pocket and not use it.
Therefore it is clear that, as the article states, airplane mode is not a significant factor for flight safety.
Risks exist on a continuum, and something not literally being forcibly banned doesn’t mean there is zero risk in that thing, just that the risk is lower than those things that are forcibly banned or that the risks can be mitigated in other ways.
Same reason you go through a metal detector to check for weapons before getting within half mile of a plane, but were left pretty much on your honor to not bring a Samsung phone with a spicy battery on board.
You know damn well I meant intolerable risk when I implied they wouldn’t allow them
I actually didn’t, which was the main reason I replied.
It’s fairly common to see people arguing as though a thing is either risky or not risky, without any sense of context.
The idea that plane safety is tied to everyone together agreeing to and remembering to push a button on their devices is absolutely insane. You think that the regulating bodies that require multiple backups for every possible system also just trust that every passenger pushes a button and every flight attendant actually checks every passengers devices?
No I don’t think that. Why wouldn’t comment make you think I think that
I think they were agreeing and meant “You” rhetorically.
Aeroplane mode is incredibly, incredibly useful, I use it a lot and I’m almost never on an aeroplane haha.
It works great as a poor man’s ad blocker.
DNS blocking has the same effect but allows you to stay connected
I remember once when I accidentally turned on my phone during a flight instantly the plane started to plummet out of the sky. The phone slipped out of my hands and I groped for it while people and service items flailed around the cabin as the plane tumbled. Finally I slipped out of my belt and grabbed it. With only 10,000 feet of altitude to spare, I finally managed to get the phone to go into shutdown mode by holding the power button down. The plane righted itself immediately, and I slipped the phone into my pocket quietly and kept a low profile for the rest of the flight.
That was close, wow. I really admire your composure in zero gravity.
I was sitting across the aisle from you and saw the whole thing unfold. To be honest, no harm no foul so you’re all good, however I’m just thankful those were the 3G days because with 5G airwaves I’m sure it would have been a faster drop.
The problem with the 5G phones is that they effect the thought waves of the pilots and put them into a deep dive trance. I can’t blame them for wearing those tinfoil hats. Modern aviation is not what they taught in flight school.
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Airlines must be pretty crazy to think not letting people use their phones is going to decrease air rage
Not having to listen to you talk on the phone while I’m trapped in a seat near you is absolutely going to decrease my air rage.
Sure people talking on the phone can be annoying, but that’s not the main thing people use their phones for - scrolling and texting are the ultimate tools for getting people to sit silently for long periods.
Not necessarily - I know plenty of people who talk to their texts. When they receive one, they’ll for example go “omg, why did she do that??” as they start typing the reply…happens enough times especially with Americans 30 and under. It’s similar how many Americans will talk to the on-screen characters in a movie theater.
It will be there forever since it got stuck as a “offline” button. People go offline for many reasons and they look for a “plane” icon.
Since when did you see/use a diskette or s dot matrix printer? You use their icons.
The people who can decide whether to throw you off the plane are telling you that you have to put it in airplane mode. Seems fucked up that they would be basing that on a myth, but regardless, I want to stay on the plane.
It’s because the airline tells them they have to require it, and it’s critical not to deviate from policy when it comes to safety. The airline is being told to require it by their governing authority, who updates rules and regulations at the speed of bureaucracy and an air of “but did you die, tho?”.
The real reason to enable airplane mode is to avoid insane in plane roaming fees, I think Ethihad just did this to me!
Everyone should leave airplane mode on whenever and wherever possible.
I use it ho properly disconnect from mobile network, if something not working with it on iPhone, disabling and enable mobile network did not do the trick, don’t know exactly why.
I use it ho properly disconnect from mobile network, if something not working with it on iPhone, disabling and enable mobile network did not do the trick, don’t know exactly why.
Because the cellular tower icon disables mobile data, but not the radios. You can tell because when you turn it off you’ll still see bars (if, you know, the radio is working).
Airplane mode on iOS disables cellular radios, but leaves WiFi and Bluetooth on. Your phone will sit there blazing (figuratively) as bright as the sun in its cellular radio spectrums trying to hit a tower when you’re 35,000 feet up, eating up your battery and potentially fucking with cell towers as you fly overhead, where WiFi and Bluetooth won’t. It also prevents potential interference from the 2G radio with the ILS the plane uses for landing (as I saw elsewhere from a pilot).
