Adam Krone

A wise military commander once pointed out an Officer should never give an order he knows will be ignored. EG Don't tell a teenage boy not to glance at women in bikini's. A good PIC will not allow his FO to text on their personal cell phone while the aircraft is taxiing. One of the rationales listed was the Delta pilots overflying MSP while involved in a discussion of computer software. Would remind the FAA that it wasn't simply the laptop that resulted in the overflight, but also an incorrect frequency change and failure to check in with Center. Laptop discussion but right frequency would have landed in MSP. Would also remind the FAA that there was an overflight in Hawaii when both pilots fell asleep-yet haven't seen any updates to the basic FAR that a pilot should consider themselves well rested or not fly proposed. In fact, the Cargo cutout of the updated rest regulations is indicative of accepted risk. A reminder on an aircraft checklist to confirm cell phone is OFF is different than prohibiting their use. As a commercial pilot, I would say there are 3-5 occurrences during the course of the year that a pilot I'm flying with will discover they inadvertently left their phone on. It is telling that if this rule is adopted, I will be prohibited from reading a novel on my Kindle but permitted to read study material or aircraft manuals on my Kindle. Prohibited from playing sudoku on my iPhone but permitted to play sudoku if it's on paper. Prohibited from showing off pictures of my kids on my iPad, but permitted to look at pictures\flash cards of my aircraft to study for recurrent training. Any of these to excess could be distracting, but so are involved conversations between Capt and FO. Our minds are not equipped well to sitting in 1 spot for 2-5 hours (or more) with no distractions watching the autopilot fly the plane at cruise altitude. (prohibited to hand fly in RVSM airspace)