On Thu, 27 Jan 2011 15:31:03 -0800, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> There's probably nothing that prevents the cell signal from being used,
>> and if the plane is already doomed, turning on a cell phone isn't
>> likely to make things worse.
> 
> The primary reason not to do this is that your phone will be in range of
> many more towers than you normally would be. For some cell systems, this
> is a Bad Thing, for performance, capacity, and possibly even for
> routing. It probably has nothing to do with the actual plane
> electronics.

Well, I do recall that the Mythbusters tested this myth, and it rated 
"plausible" with relation to the electronics.  Still, I've been on plenty 
of planes where people have not turned off their phones and they all made 
it to their destination without incident...

Jim

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