I've flown on 787s three times before, and am about to do so again later today.
The prior times I used my cell phone as normal and didn't give it any thought.
This time I'll pay particular attention and report back. Twice for me have
been Ethiopian Air, once London-Addis, once Dulles-Addis. The third time was
ANA Osaka-San Francisco. Today will be London-Addis again, but a different
actual plane, since the previous one is one of the ones that burned.
-Bill
> On Jun 2, 2014, at 10:03, "Tom Van Baak" <t...@leapsecond.com> wrote:
>
> 1) When I fly I often use my iPhone while on the ground, before take-off or
> after landing.
>
> 2) I sometimes carry a GPS receiver. When permitted (varies by airline), it's
> fun to log NMEA data for a flight and later plot the flight path and duration
> with UTC accuracy.
>
> 3) On occasion I also bring a logging Geiger counter. It's amazing how much
> background radiation there is up at flight altitude compared to down at
> ground level. You can go from 10 or 20 CPM (counts per minute) at home to,
> say, 500! CPM at 40k feet. Those of you who live in mile-high Colorado enjoy
> higher background levels. I know, because my Geiger counter was wonderfully
> close to 60 CPM (= 1 CPS) in a hotel near NIST. Yes, I have the 1PPS ADEV
> plot for this and, yes, background radiation makes the world's worst "atomic"
> clock.
>
> Anyway, over the years I've collected some nice GPS
> latitude/longitude/altitude data sets as well as background radiation as a
> function of altitude. Just to be clear, I do turn off these devices according
> to airline regulations.
>
> Now I have never had a problem with reception in the terminal, walkway, or
> even while seated inside a plane. I figured the aluminum frame of the plane
> was thin enough that photons at cell, GPS, and gamma frequencies easily pass
> through the outer shell or the windows.
>
> But last week I flew the new composite Boeing 787 Dreamliner and noticed
> something quite different. From the second I entered the plane, I lost both
> cell and GPS reception. It didn't matter how close I was to a window or not.
> I know the word "composite" sounds inert, but carbon fiber must be somewhat
> conductive, yes? And there must be serious lightning suppression layers too,
> maybe? Furthermore, the B787 windows are exotic; like giant oval LCD screens
> which electronically dim from near transparent to very opaque. Does all this
> make the new 787 a record-holding RF-tight flying Faraday cage?
>
> Is this the first airplane in history where a time-nut can't receive GPS? At
> least gamma rays make it though, so I got RAD data. But no GPS data. Not a
> single SV fix the entire time I was inside the plane.
>
> Has anyone else noticed this? Or know about this? Please respond only if you
> have real information. I can speculate as well as anyone; so it's solid
> technical, RF, EMF, or composite carbon fiber engineering info I'm looking
> for.
>
> Thanks,
> /tvb
>
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