got his *** booted off an AA flight TMZ's report is a little more damning in that Baldwin was walking around and slamming doors after being told to turn off his phone. What a damned moron. I get people hate the airlines, but, this has nothing to do with the airline. The FAA regulates that no devices once the door closes, and if AA doesn't abide by it, it gets fined. Any other airline would have done the same thing. So Baldwin can't put down Words With Friends to the point he gets kicked off the plane and then launches a twitter war against AA? Gimme a break, why the hell isn't this guy flying in a gulfstream, I thought he was a celebrity. And it's WWF, it's not a first person shooter or something that can't be paused, it'll be there when you reach cruising altitude (wifi applicable).
The FAA regulates that no devices once the door closes.... What? I've been on a SWA flight where the pilot let people turn on their portable electronic devices once we got in the air. Not immediately, but after about 10 minutes. Sorry to interject some facts here. Please go back to calling Baldwin a damned moron.
He's an effing idiot anyway. He gives speeches to Occupy protesters while making commercials for Capitol One. Also, that audio of him talking to his daughter is completely unforgivable.
Hollywood types get far too much attention off the screen. He should have been ignored for the *** he is.
Commercial frequencies are not the same as those used by aviation; the plane's cabling is adequately shielded. There is little to no reason to not allow passengers to use their electronic devices, networked or not, on a plane. At any time. Link
There are a lot of reasons to not let them talk on their phones, however. It could be dangerous if they sit next to me. I am apt to make noise, moaning noises and fart sounds.
Sorry Perham, there are reasons to disallow it during takeoff/landing. Few rules are more confounding to airline passengers than those regarding the use of cell phones and portable electronic devices. Are these gadgets really hazardous to flight? And if so, why are the rules enforced so arbitrarily? Before getting to cell phones, passengers should know that the restrictions pertaining to computers, iPods, and certain other devices have nothing to do with electronic interference at all. In theory, a poorly shielded notebook computer can emit harmful energy, but the main reasons laptops need to be put away for takeoff and landing is to prevent them from becoming high-speed projectiles in the event of an impact or sudden deceleration, and to help keep the passageways clear during an evacuation. Your computer is a piece of luggage, and luggage needs to be stowed so it doesn’t kill somebody or get in the way. In the case of iPods and the like, it’s about the headphones. During takeoffs and landings, you need to be able to hear and follow instructions if there’s an emergency. That’s hard to do if you’ve got your MP3 player cranked to 11. Similar to the requirement to raise your window shades, it’s in the interest of situational awareness. A bit excessive? Maybe, and after all, flight attendants don’t go around waking people up or quizzing them on evacuation procedures. But what the heck, it a slight safety enhancement that doesn’t cost anything. Now, as for cell phones. The million-dollar question: Can cellular communications really interfere with cockpit equipment? The answer is potentially yes, but probably not. You want something meatier than that, I know, but that’s about as accurate an answer as exists. Although cellular phones are unlikely to screw anything up, regulators are erring on the better-safe-than-sorry side. Cockpit hardware and software use radio transmissions for a number of tasks. Whether transmitting, receiving, or simply sitting idle, cell phones are able to garble these signals. As you might expect, aircraft electronics are designed and shielded with this interference in mind. This should mitigate any ill effects, and to date there are no proven cases where a cell phone has adversely affected the outcome of a flight. But you never know, and in some situations, i.e. in the presence of old or faulty shielding, it’s possible that a telephone could bring about some sort of anomaly. Now, notice that I say “anomaly” and not “flaming wreckage.” You imagine some hapless passenger hitting the SEND button when suddenly the airplane explodes, flips over, or nose-dives into the ground. In reality, should it occur, interference is liable to be subtle, transient, and in the end harmless. People have a hard time grasping that each and every in-flight problem is not an impending catastrophe, and this is no exception. The electronic architecture of a modern jetliner is vast to say the least, and most irregularities aren’t exactly heart-stoppers – a warning flag that flickers for a moment and then goes away; a course line that briefly goes askew. Or something unseen. I’m occasionally asked if I have ever personally witnessed cellular interference in a cockpit. Not to my knowledge, but I can’t say for sure. Planes are large and complicated; minor, fleeting malfunctions of this or that component aren’t uncommon. Having said that, cell phones may have had a role in at least two serious incidents. Some blame a phone for the unsolved crash of a Crossair regional plane in Switzerland in 2000, claiming that spurious transmissions confused the plane’s autopilot. In another case, a regional jet forced to make an emergency landing after a fire alarm was triggered by a ringing phone in the luggage compartment. There have been many other, anecdotal reports of trouble allegedly brought on by phones. >Even if not actively connected, a cell phone’s power-on mode dispatches bursts of potentially harmful energy. For this reason, all phones must be placed in the proverbial “off position” prior to taxiing. This is requested at the beginning of each flight as part of the never tedious pre-takeoff safety briefing (see briefing babble, this chapter). The policy is clearly stated but unenforced. We assume the risks are minimal, or else phones would be collected rather than relying on the honor system. I would venture to guess that at least half of all cellular phones, whether inadvertently or out of laziness, are left on during flight. That’s about a million phones on about ten thousand flights every day, just in the United States. If indeed this was a recipe for disaster, I think we’d have more evidence by now. One popular theory holds that the cell phone ban was originally enacted not out of safety concerns at all, but at the behest of wireless providers who stand to lose millions of dollars because calls made from aloft are untraceable and callers cannot be charged. Not quite, but there’s a nugget of truth in there. In America, the existing restrictions were laid out in 1991 by the FCC, not the FAA, and calls placed from fast-flying aircraft tend to jump from antenna tower to antenna tower, resulting in technical problems for the communications companies. But this is entirely separate from, and does not negate, the interference issues. Currently under trial is an onboard communications system that is able to collect and re-transmit cellular signals by way of a laptop-sized server and a series of small base stations, called “picocells,” spaced throughout the passenger cabin. Weighing about 20 pounds, a picocell automatically commands your phone to operate at greatly reduced power. Calls are then routed to ground stations one of two ways – either via satellite, or directly using special towers and a dedicated frequency band. This should eliminate both the cockpit interference hazard and the tower-to-tower signal bouncing that, for the time being, makes high-altitude calling impossible. In the meantime, it’s possible that airlines are using the mere possibility of technical complications as a convenient way of keeping the cell phone debate off the table. The minute it can be proven beyond reasonable doubt that phones are safe, a certain percentage of flyers will demand the right to use them, with the result pitting one angry group of travelers against another, with carriers stuck in the middle. If indeed airlines are playing this game, count me among those sympathetic, and who hope the prohibition stays in place — not out of technical concerns, but for the sake of human decency and some bloody peace and quiet. The sensory bombardment inside airports is overwhelming enough (see airports essay). The airplane cabin is a last refuge of relative silence. Let’s keep it that way. Heaven help us. As a last resort, perhaps we can have “chattering” and “non-chattering” sections, akin to the old smoking and nonsmoking.
I think the point is that Baldwin should be expected to follow the same rules and/or policies as the rest of us. And he should do so without making a scene. Quit making excuses Perham.
Loved him in Hunt for Red October, Malice, Glengarry Glen Ross, and The Departed, and I think his work in 30 Rock is comic genius. But he's an uberdick, and I'd stick a fork in my eye if I had to sit next to him during a flight.
So much disinformation. The F.A.A. admits that its reasons have nothing to do with the undivided attention of passengers or the fear of Kindles flying out of passengers’ hands in case there is turbulence.. Please read and learn. Link
First of all, none of you have a personal experience with Alec Baldwin and haven't the foggiest clue what kind of person he is. Neither do I, I have several friends that have interacted with him out in California, both personally and professionally, and to a person they say he's a nice guy and a great guy to just hang out with.
He's such a great guy he berates his young daughter over the phone. And that was just what was discovered. No telling what he's said to her other times. So second hand info says he's a great guy. Wonderful. Sounds like a douche who needs his *** beat to me.
He basically played himself in a movie called State and Main a few years ago, written and directed by David Mamet. It was hilarious; I don't know if he figured out Mamet was making fun of him. HIghly recommend the film as a whole: Charles Durning, Bill Macy, Horseface Actress from SEx and the City, Phillip Seymour HOffman and a bunch of great character actors.
