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Electromagnetic interference to aircraft systems is the most common argument put forth for banning passenger electronic devices on planes

When a base station connects to a cell phone, it can communicate to the phone that it should increase the strength of its transmission if it recognises that the phone signal is hard to detect. Phones in aircraft are so far from the ground that they will power up for this reason. This increases the chance of interference to the aircraft's navigation system, especially if there are many phones operating on the plane at the same time.

However, new technology using pico cells forces the phones to connect to an onboard base station (which then transmits to the terrestrial network via satellite) and the phones only need to use minimum power to do this. If a pico cell system is operating it is safe to use a cell phone and several airlines (particularly in Europe) are now offering in-flight mobile communications.

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8y ago

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