The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASE) made a press release yesterday promising to publish by the end of this month new guidance, which will finally (!) allow air passengers to use their personal electronic devices (PED), such as mobile phones, e-book readers, tablets, mp3 players, etc., during all phases of a flight (EASA allows use of Electronic Devices on board). The devices will need to be set to a 'flight mode', but it's a huge progress over current state of affairs. For safety reasons, bigger PEDs such as laptops will still need to be stowed during taxiing, take-off and landing. But there will be no more need to stop reading your book on your Kindle just when it is getting interesting. These changes will need to be adopted by European airlines. Yay for technology progress! Or for getting rid of unnecessary bureaucratic requirements, since as Toby Ziegler once said: "We're flying in a Lockheed Eagle series L1011. It came off the line 20
months ago. It carries a Sim-5 Transponder tracking system. Are you
telling me I can still flummox this thing with something I bought at
Radio Shack?"
