Snakes on a Plane

It’s always irritated me enormously that we all have to go through the ritual of turning off our mobiles when we get onto a plane. I find it annoying not because I want to use the phone – to be frank, it’s a relief to have an excuse to turn the bloody thing off; no, I get annoyed by the sheer stupidity of it.

They tell us that we must turn our phones off because otherwise they will interfere with the controls, the plane will crash to the ground, we’ll all die and the airline will be sued by our families. All-in-all, a situation to be avoided.

So why are we allowed to take our phones onto the plane at all? Why aren’t we all strip-searched, bent over at the gate by the guys with rubber gloves and searched in our secret places for hidden SIMs?

I mean the plane will crash and we’ll all die etc if just one phone slips through the security net.

I admit to getting off a flight to Berlin last week and finding my mobile had been on during the entirety of the flight. I thought I’d switched it off before boarding the plane but I hadn’t. When reminded by the arm waving trolley-dolley, I couldn’t check it because it was in the overhead locker and I was strapped into the window seat with two strangers between me and it.

Yet somehow we all survived.

This rant has been brought about because the Federal Aviation Administration is reviewing the use of in-flight electronic devices which is expected to allow greater use of them.

BUT IT”S NOT REVIEWING THE USE OF MOBILE PHONES.

Pffnrrrr.

You can read why here (don’t expect to be enlightened).

http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/09/technology/in-flight-cell-phones/index.html