Mobile Phones on Plane
Ofcom the regulatory body of Telecommunication in UK will be considering allowing Mobile Telephone calls in British Planes.The move is being considered by telecoms and air safety agencies throughout the European Union after the Electronic Communications Committee, a European agency, recently gave the go-ahead in principle. Ofcom is the first telecom regulator to support the idea publicly, but Air France is already looking into fitting one of its latest Airbus aircraft with the system with OnAir, an offshoot of Airbus SAS.
While airlines have offered in-flight outbound telephone services through airline networks, the U.K. proposal will let passengers use their own handsets to make calls, Ofcom said in a statement. The service still requires approval by the Civil Aviation Authority, the U.K.’s air transportation regulator.
The base station technology under consideration is a GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) 1800-MHz pico-cell system that prevents direct connection of the mobile terminals onboard with mobile networks on the ground. The main problem when using mobile phones on aircraft is not interference with the plane’s systems, but that it confuses mobile phone base stations on the ground below the plane. More..