[cmdahler]

Originally Posted by DJHARKAVY

But that's the thing... If there were a reason why electronics should not be used on an airplane, it WOULD be reliable and reproducible.

Ah, but you are not looking at the issue the way a safety-oriented regulatory agency approaches the problem. There have been incidents reported by reliable people (flight crew) that indicate some electrical problems on the airplane seemed to be attributable to a personal electronic device back in the cabin. The very fact that these incidents cannot be reproduced under testing conditions is cause for extreme concern: random events with un-reproducible results are the worst sort of headache. The safety-minded regulatory agency, i.e. FAA, decides to err on the side of caution and prohibit the devices' use during a critical phase of flight.

That can actually be attributed to cell phones? Please show data.

The potential problem is with any kind of radiating electrical device. If you're concerned about electrical devices' EMFs in general, then a device that is designed by its very nature to radiate would naturally be at the top of the list of concern.

I'll have to say a lot, because I don't know what you are talking about...

Certain types of approaches to landing are required to be conducted with the autopilot all the way to touchdown - the pilot cannot manually fly the airplane because the visibility is so poor that he cannot see out the windshield. Now, do you think that's a good time to test out something you saw on Mythbusters? Or do you think that, perhaps, since there has been the occasional random event, at least one in particular which involved an electronic device causing the autopilot to suddenly disconnect, this might be a better moment to err on the side of caution and turn the cell phone off?