Does listening to folks yak incessantly on their cellphones in restaurants or on buses drive you mad?
Well, consider how you would feel if Johnny Blabber was given the green light to talk all he wanted on his cellphone during a trans-Atlantic flight.
It could happen…and sooner than you think.
Earlier this week the European Union opened the way for air travelers to use cellphones to talk, text or send e-mails on planes flying throughout Europe’s airspace.
According to travel experts, midair cellphone service may be available in a few months on some airlines for passengers using European GSM technology. Currently, the United States and many other countries have banned cellphone use in the air because of concerns that the devices could interfere with the plane’s instruments. But under the new European plan cellphone users could make and receive calls through an onboard base station. Passengers would be allowed to turn their phones on after the plane reaches 10,000 feet, the same elevation that other electronic devices such as portable music players and laptops are permitted.
Obviously passengers, especially business travelers, embrace the idea. However, there are those who are not exactly rallying around the new move. Some of the issues being raised are the cost of mid-flight phone service (which is expected to be sky high) and the dreaded thought of having to be trapped next to a blabbing passenger for six hours straight.
The European Commission, the EU’s executive body, announced it plans to carefully monitor pricing and it’s urging airlines to create in-flight phone etiquette rules.
Several airlines, including Air France-KLM, have already launched a trial of in-flight cellphone services on some European routes. While others, including Germany’s Lufthansa chose not to introduce the service because its surveys show that the majority of its customers wanted to fly in peace.
I’m one of them.
What do you think about the new service? Would you want to be stuck next to a yakkity–yakker on a red-eye?
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