[mertd]

Initially people assumed without evidence that the wireless signals from portable devices would interfere with avionics. It was the days where you could prophetically "hear" that you are about to get a call or sms through your computer speakers.

[akira2501]

> people assumed without evidence

If you don't have evidence that emissions will be within acceptable limits and will not interfere with the planes avionics then you don't introduce things into life safety critical areas like planes.

It's the same reason a captain can declare pretty much whatever they want on their plane and you as a passenger are _obligated_ to follow those orders. It's a felony if you don't. The captain doesn't have to present evidence just any concern that some action might interfere with the safety of his flight and that's the end of the discussion.

[fy20]

The ironic thing is that during the same period, 110V powered electric shavers - which most likely spurt out noise all over the RF spectrum - were perfectly acceptable to use on aircraft.

[pixl97]

I mean I've never seen 200 people use an electric shaver for an entire flight. He'll, I don't think I've seen one.

[macintux]

So, uh, apparently I was unaware of this rule: I used one about 35 years ago. I was flying to Europe, and didn’t have a compatible power adapter when I landed in Helsinki, so I used the plane’s lavatory on the hop to Sweden.

[tomcam]

You monster

[abdullahkhalids]

That might be the original reason, but I think that the current reason for asking for flightmode on a plane is that cell towers near airports get overburdened, as every flight would result in every phone rapidly switching between a dozen cell phone towers.

[riffraff]

I heard of this years ago, but wouldn't this be also a problem for cell towers near railways?

[abdullahkhalids]

That's a good observation. It seems it is possible to plan cell towers for this [1, 2]. But perhaps, tech has not been deployed everywhere for regulations to be changed.

[1] https://www.quora.com/How-does-LTE-perform-on-high-speed-rai...

[2] https://www.huawei.com/en/media-center/multimedia/videos/202...

[albrewer]

> it was the days where you could prophetically "hear" that you are about to get a call or sms through your computer speakers

When I was getting my private pilot's license in '07, my instructor put his cell phone in the Cessna's glovebox (which is just below the radio) and told me to call him. There was definitely interference throughout me ringing him, but as soon as he took the phone out to cancel the call, the interference went away.

[jjav]

> Initially people assumed without evidence

That's like configuring a firewall with a default-allow rule.

No, with any safety critical system you must assume there might be a problem until there is overwhelming evidence that there won't be.

[TaylorAlexander]

Sounds like they did have evidence then...