Odds are, you’re not going to get thrown off a plane on your next cross-country flight as Alec Baldwin was.

But airline requirements that you shut down your smartphone and tablet can be a nuisance for PR industry pros and other communicators who rely on 24/7 connection.

Baldwin made the news recently when he was escorted off a flight because he refused to turn off his cell phone while playing Words With Friends.

Though Baldwin’s behavior might not be a model of passenger decorum, many share his frustration. A recent poll indicates that young travelers are unhappy with the rule that requires them to turn off their gadgets during takeoff and landing.

Besides, the Federal Aviation Administration recently agreed to allow iPads in the cockpit, prompting the age-old question popular on schoolyards and among siblings: If they can, why can’t we?

Industry attitudes

So what do PR pros and other frequent flyers think about the rule? We asked around, and the answers ranged from shrugs to irritation.

Peter Shankman, creator of Help a Reporter Out, racks up 250,000 miles of air travel a year, and he’s impatient with flight attendants’ requests to turn off the devices.

Reached as he disembarked from a flight in LaGuardia Airport, he said, “The only difference between what Alec Baldwin does and hundreds of thousands of us do every day is that he got caught.”

He added that hundreds of thousands of flights take off and land safely every day, and devices don’t seem to be a problem.

“With all this technology, you’re going to tell me that ‘Angry Birds’ is going to bring down the f---ing plane?” Shankman says. “With all of that, you’re going to tell me that me sending a text to my wife saying, ‘I love you,’ is going to radically change the flight course of the 737 that I just exited about two seconds ago?”

‘A couple of disconnected moments’

Mike Schaffer, director of social media at iostudio, says he doesn’t mind being offline for the first 15 to 20 minutes of a flight; it affords him time to catch up on his reading.

“I don’t lose sleep over having a couple of disconnected moments in my day,” says Schaffer, who flies 50,000 miles a year on business. His beef is that the requirement isn’t properly explained by the airlines or the Federal Aviation Administration.

“If there is a safety concern and it’s properly communicated to people, I don’t think it’s that big a deal,” he says. “We go through security metal detectors and take our belts and shoes off to make sure we’re safe. Why would we skirt around safety guidelines when we actually board?”

FAA spokesman Les Dorr says the iPads and handheld devices are different sides of the same coin, although not in the way passengers might think. The FAA requires devices to be switched off below 10,000 feet.

However, it recently allowed American Airlines pilots to carry their electronic flight information in iPads rather than on paper, the first such request from a major carrier, Dorr says. This required AA to demonstrate that this was safe over thousands of hours of monitoring time.

But there’s no way to establish the safety of handheld devices for a plane full of people, he says.

“You’re talking about literally hundreds of different combinations of types of devices, makes of devices, models of devices in probably many different states of repair and function,” Dorr says.

Other disruptions—of safety and courtesy

Communications strategist Shel Holtz, principal of Holtz Communication + Technology, logs about 200,000 miles per year, and he has seen research suggesting that turning electronic devices on and off is more disruptive to aviation communications systems than just having them on. He finds it silly that he has to turn off his Kindle.

But he adds, “These are the rules, and it irks me no end when people on planes think they can pick and choose the rules they'll follow. I get just as pissed off at somebody texting away 10 minutes after the announcement to turn devices off was made as I do at the guy who brings on three bags and sticks them all in the overhead—despite the two-bag limit and the instruction to put one in the space under the seat in front of you.”

Baldwin’s representative, Matthew Hiltzik, was understandably reluctant to leap into the fray once again on this issue, and he declined to discuss the specific incident.

But he said, “A lot of people have related to the frustration of not being able to use your device even while still at the gate. Hopefully something positive can come out of this to create clearer, more understandable guidelines to allow easier interactions between passengers and the crew.”

Contacted by PR Daily, American said in a statement that the FAA has found that mobile devices can interfere with onboard electronics and can endanger a flight’s safety.

“Not all devices do, but because it would be impossible to check every device someone carries onboard an aircraft, use of all devices is banned during takeoff and landing—critical phases of flight,” American stated.

Devices that broadcast a signal, such as cell phones, are banned during all phases of flight, it added.

Brad Phillips of Phillips Media Relations says he can’t recall the last time he took a flight in which he didn’t see someone sneakily using a smartphone or other device during landing and takeoff.

“It’s clear to me that the flight attendants have a pretty lax attitude toward enforcement,” he says. He and others question whether the rules are necessary. Still, he says, it’s not up to passengers to decide.

“I err on the side of caution, and I wish my fellow travelers would,” he says.

Holtz agrees. Those who don’t like the rules can advocate for changes, he says.

“There's no democracy on a plane,” he says. “You're under FAA rules, and the pilot is God. That's just the way it is. Deal with it, or don't fly.”

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