makfan

I know there was once a long thread about Alaska's policy requiring electronic devices to be turned off BEFORE the aircraft door was closed. Our flight attendant tonight announced that on May 25, the policy would be changed to having to turn off devices WHEN the aircraft door was closed.

This is similar to the policy on other airlines that I fly. This will certainly help for those times when the announcement is made to turn things off and then we sit there for several minutes (door open) waiting for baggage to load, maintenance to sign off a log, etc.

apodo77

Great. Now people who think they are more important than they really, talking about crap that can wait until they land will be talking a few more minutes.

PetePDX

I guess I'm fortunate in that I really haven't sat next to many passengers who are actually talking on their phones. More folks I've encountered are texting or updating e-mail.

sea_jeff

I consider this to be a most welcome development.

I'm usually cranking out a last minute email or text so this is good news.^

Eastbay1K

As much as that can "be annoying" from time to time, there are plenty of people who are reading a book that isn't made of paper.

slopeboy40

+1

I just hope this isn't the first crack in to allowing cell phone use in flight.

jackal

^^^^

Ditto. I can count on one (OK, maybe two) hand the number of times I've heard phone conversations during boarding. Either that's not a big concern, or most people are actually fairly reasonable with their vocal volume levels when on the phone.

Ditto! I'm lucky to now have a job that allows me to travel pretty freely as long as I stay caught up on work. And since all of my work is real-time (answering emails, processing transactions), it's not stuff I can just cache and deal with later. Time is often of the essence, since a missed window can mean the difference between one of the transactions going through or being denied.

That's coming someday anyway. This has absolutely no effect on that. This is just a realignment of the way the current FAA regs about PEDs are interpreted for AS.

In hindsight, I did write the FAA about this some time ago--at least a couple years, I think. I wonder if my email had anything to do with this change. If so, it sure took 'em long enough.

98103

the rules have NEVER been a deterrent to those texting on smart phones. I'm sure you've seen them. They hide the device from the flight attendants in order to get a few more messages off. Now they'll just keep them on just that little bit longer.

mthoodfan

It's only a matter of time. Virgin Atlantic is now offering that service on some of its planes (except when over U.S. airspace).

http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/us/en...eromobile.html

makfan

For me it is just a few more minutes to read my eBook or send another email/text. Such is the world we live in. I don't like being always on, but getting as much sent out before the 20 minutes or so of dead time from door closure to 10,000 feet can be important some days.

I'm very good about complying. When I hear the door close on an AA flight, I put my phone and iPad in airplane mode and then power off. But I hate having to turn it off on an AS flight, only to have the captain come on the PA two minutes later saying we are waiting for a mechanic to come sign off the log book and that it will be another few minutes before we really can leave the gate. My phone takes a while to restart from off.

It's a little thing, but from what I recall it irked a bunch of people. They also tend to have us shut down devices well before 10,000 feet on the descent. I do push this one a bit but if the flight attendant asks me directly I will turn it off. Once I hear the double chime, I shut down right away regardless of instructions.

dave1013

Good on ya for complying, makfan. I, too, have an iPhone and notice more often than not when a seatmate has one, that they haven't powered it down during flight. When they take it out of their purse/seatback/etc., they simply hit the home button, the screen lights up and they text away or make a call. No waiting for boot-up.

czpdx

This is what I do nowadays...in airplane mode, though FWIW. I was recently on a SEA-PDX flight across the aisle from a pilot (in uniform) who did the exact same thing with his iPad...and didn't even wait for the 10,000 feet chime to turn it on.

CDKing

Or like my last flight on UA where my seat mate was texting even after wheels lifted of and was texting again about 2 min before we touched the ground

sea_jeff

With all this texting, iPad usage and Kindle reading during take off and landing I'm surprised that planes haven't fallen out of the sky yet!

Oh wait - just remembered that there have been exactly zero incidents related to portable electronics.

apodo77

As an FYI both my flights yesterday (PDX-SEA and SEA-IAH) was the standard "can't shut the door until all electronics are turned off".