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This is great for Apple but has to be terrifying for the competition. United didn't purchase a mix of Touchpads, Xooms and iPads. They standardized on iPads. Inkling doesn't produced textbooks for Android, Honeycomb and iOS. They only support iOS.

The more this happens the more the iPad becomes a de facto standard and the more difficult it is for competitors to break into the iPad market.
 
The primary use for an iPad is entertainment. It IS a toy in 90% of peoples minds.

Flying an Airplane is a serious thing. You have countless lives in your care.

Yes I know you think it's cool and are hypnotized by the big touch screen.

But I don't care, I don't want my pilot distracted by a stupid toy!
 
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Hype without reason?

These supposed paper and fuel savings are nothing without a comparison — what's the ecological footprint of 11000 iPads?

And what happens when the iPad fails or runs out of battery — something that has yet to happen to me with a real book!

(Apart from that, I have to wonder how practical it is that pilots always need access to 12000 pages of stuff, sounds like an awful lot, even with a search function.)
 
I call ********. iPads aren't saving on fuel by cutting weight.

Complete ********.

Not only that, but everyone knows that you always have to have a hard copy of whatever you are trying to use for an electronic device. So the maps are there on the plane weather an iPad is or not.

You've got no clue about what your talking about. The pilots replace their personal flight kits at about 40lbs each with iPads. The aircraft will still have a "backup" set of minimum pubs onboard that has always been on board, stored in the cockpit, regardless of what form of manuals the pilot carries. It is (at least at Delta) sealed in plastic to ensure its contents aren't used and misplaced. It is the so called "backup". The iPads replace the two pilot bags that you see pilots drag through airports, hanging on the back of their roll-aboard. At Delta, we stopped carrying those about a year ago, and the company provides the pilot materials at each cockpit seat in paper form, still 40 lbs each, so they reduced the waste of having 12,500 pilots carry these pubs. So at Delta, there are about 1,500 of these now, one for each of two seats across a fleet of 750 aircraft. But the weight of 80 lbs per aircraft (the pilot's company provided pubs at each seat) will be replaced with iPads.

If you recall your physics, you can not lift 80 lbs of weight to 40,000 feet without expending energy (fuel). How much energy would it take if you devised a canon that could shoot 80 lbs to that altitude and across the country? To say it costs nothing to carry these pubs as compared to carrying two iPads is true ignorance. At Delta, they have numbers for how much it costs to carry an extra can of Coke on a flight, and savings gained through lighter service trays and glassware. We fly nearly 100,000 flights per year, it all adds up very quickly. Stick to what you know. The airline industry and how it operates is clearly not on that "list".
 
Each iPad, which weighs less than 1.5 pounds, will replace approximately 38 pounds of paper operating manuals, navigation charts, reference handbooks, flight checklists, logbooks and weather information in a pilot's flight bag. A conventional flight bag full of paper materials contains an average of 12,000 sheets of paper per pilot. The green benefits of moving to EFBs are two-fold--it significantly reduces paper use and printing, and, in turn, reduces fuel consumption. The airline projects EFBs will save nearly 16 million sheets of paper a year which is equivalent to more than 1,900 trees not cut down. Saving 326,000 gallons of jet fuel a year reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 3,208 metric tons.

36.5 pounds save 326,000 gallons of jet fuel a year and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 3,208 metric tons :eek:

That's incredible, I wonder if there is anything else that can be done to reduce weight. :)

EDIT: just realized some of the savings would be from the more current weather patterns and flight alerts, either way still great.
 
You've got no clue about what your talking about. The pilots replace their personal flight kits at about 40lbs each with iPads. The aircraft will still have a "backup" set of minimum pubs onboard that has always been on board, stored in the cockpit, regardless of what form of manuals the pilot carries. It is (at least at Delta) sealed in plastic to ensure its contents aren't used and misplaced. It is the so called "backup". The iPads replace the two pilot bags that you see pilots drag through airports, hanging on the back of their roll-aboard. At Delta, we stopped carrying those about a year ago, and the company provides the pilot materials at each cockpit seat in paper form, still 40 lbs each, so they reduced the waste of having 12,500 pilots carry these pubs. So at Delta, there are about 1,500 of these now, one for each of two seats across a fleet of 750 aircraft. But the weight of 80 lbs per aircraft (the pilot's company provided pubs at each seat) will be replaced with iPads.

If you recall your physics, you can not lift 80 lbs of weight to 40,000 feet without expending energy (fuel). How much energy would it take if you devised a canon that could shoot 80 lbs to that altitude and across the country? To say it costs nothing to carry these pubs as compared to carrying two iPads is true ignorance. At Delta, they have numbers for how much it costs to carry an extra can of Coke on a flight, and savings gained through lighter service trays and glassware. We fly nearly 100,000 flights per year, it all adds up very quickly. Stick to what you know. The airline industry and how it operates is clearly not on that "list".

i'm willing to bet that it costs more to reprint something due to a change than the fuel to carry 40 pounds
 
But the weight of 80 lbs per aircraft (the pilot's company provided pubs at each seat) will be replaced with iPads.

If you recall your physics, you can not lift 80 lbs of weight to 40,000 feet without expending energy (fuel)...

reducing each flight by 80 lbs is probably less than 0.01% of the total weight including the plane, fuel, passengers, etc.

if that saves 326,000 gallons of jet fuel a year, they are still using over 3,000,000,000 gallons of jet fuel a year. the savings probably cover the cost of the ipads. if it's not greenwashing, it's at least green-meh.
 
This is complete **** ****!!!!!!! One would have to be a complete moron to navigate without the use of paper charts and as far as saving fuel you gotta be kidding me!!!!!! I wouldn't step foot on a plane if I knew they were only relying on an iPad!!!!!!

Fortunately, they aren't just relying on iPads to fly the plane. In fact, the iPad's role is realistically, quite minor compared to the thousands of other electronic devices mounted on modern aircraft which have been shown to cause all kinds of failures and fatal crashes in the wrong circumstances, sometimes through system failure, and other times by simple misapplication and poor training.

But hey, if the iPad on board of all things is going to prevent you from flying, well, maybe that's one less irrational passenger I have to deal with when *I* fly.
 
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re original article
i'm for it as long as
1) safety is improved
2) flight times are met
3) cheaper plane tickets
 
There are so many stupid posts in this thread my head hurts. I wish morons would read all the posts before commenting.
 
These supposed paper and fuel savings are nothing without a comparison — what's the ecological footprint of 11000 iPads?

And what happens when the iPad fails or runs out of battery — something that has yet to happen to me with a real book!

(Apart from that, I have to wonder how practical it is that pilots always need access to 12000 pages of stuff, sounds like an awful lot, even with a search function.)

These pubs are on a revision cycle of every two weeks. Not only is it a massive amount of paper, and a considerable amount of weight to continually lift to altitude, it also cost money and fuel to ship these 12,500 revisions every 14 days. I think you would have to see the sheer volume of paper we go through with these things. It's a total waste, that is harder to recycle/reclaim than an iPad as well. Reclaim 1,500 iPads every 2 years or the equivalent of 30 million sheets of paper (at least - 1,500 sets of paper manuals X 12,000 pages = 18 million - we revise and replace hundreds of pages every two weeks all year long).

As for the battery, we'll just keep them plugged into the cigarette lighter - (just under the cup-holders)
 
reducing each flight by 80 lbs is probably less than 0.01% of the total weight including the plane, fuel, passengers, etc.

if that saves 326,000 gallons of jet fuel a year, they are still using over 3,000,000,000 gallons of jet fuel a year. the savings probably cover the cost of the ipads, but i still call greenwashing.

It is the airline industry, ironically, that proved that eliminating even the smallest items can make huge differences in the aggregate.

If you want to call it greenwashing, fine. Does that mean you would you rather they go ahead and continue to consume the 326,000 gallons extra per year? I don't. Nor do I think that United should go ahead and just stop doing all of the other fuel-conserving actions they've taken recently, which again, in the aggregate, can add up when combined with the iPad gambit.

Of course, we could just stop flying altogether, ground all the planes... maybe that wouldn't be viewed so cynically? But then of course, all of the Apple devices you have in your sig line probably would've taken a lot longer to get to you, since they arrive from China by plane.

While I'm sure that being green wasn't the top reason to be handing out these iPads, a nice side effect is that it's become one of many ways to reduce pollution and conserve resources, and that's a good thing.
 
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Serious question to ponder.

Is UA admitting that we don't need to turn off our portable electronics now?

Cause I sure as hell would like to keep mine on (not that I really turn anything like this "off")

No. You still have to. Those iPads were probably tested a million times and certified safe for use with navigation systems, and not **any** iPad, only the tested iPads could be used.

I know I know, chances that the shiny new iPhone interfering with navigation systems is less than 1 in a million, but do you want to be on that flight?

I think waiting for 15 minutes until the plane hits 10K+, and 15 minutes until it lands is not asking for too much.
 
Forgive me if this was already asked/answered, I just skimmed thread. But does this prove that the shut off electronic devices rule is BS? Why would it be safe to have ipads on in the cockpit but not in the cabin during takeoffs or do they power theirs down at that point. (Or has the rule changed, haven't been on a plane in a few years)
 
I really love to see the modernisation of flight bags and I'm excited to hear the mass roll out. The paper-savings will definitely be beneficial to the environment and save many trees.

But I'm not really convinced by their fuel-savings figures. I'm a mechanical and aerospace engineer and I worked on a project calculating just that for Airbus last year.

Say 300k gallons of fuel is about 1000t of fuel and a wide-body aircraft typically burns 6-10t of fuel per hour. This equates to about 10-20 long haul flights. Two bags of 20kg each are almost negligible in a 100+ tonne (OEW) plane and there are more effective ways to save fuel burn.

Nevertheless, every bit saved is better than nothing. I'd definitely hear what their pilots think. :)
 
A Pilot's View and an Anti-Green Rant

As a long-time private pilot and computer professional, I like the idea but have some safety concerns, especially for commercial flights.

Safe flight is all about back-up systems. The obvious backup to an iPad would be paper charts. I hope that the airlines have the wisdom to continue carrying at least one flight bag with paper charts to use in-flight when the iPads fail. Remember Murphy's law.... it will fail.

I liked what I see EXCEPT for the GREEN GARBAGE. I am so SICK of "GREEN" that I'm avoiding anything that says "green" on the package.

I don't mind such things when consumers can make the choice but the government and certain tree-hugger groups want to force us all to do their bidding.

Recycling is a hassle and I stopped doing it. I don't like CFL compact florescent lamps. The light is too dim, is not the color I need and takes too long to turn on. I tried them and went back to instant-on incandescent lamps. I drive the largest SUV I could find because it's comfortable and we burn lights day and night so we can see. The government is forcing us to burn ethanol even though it reduces gas mileage by 8% and damages older engines. To avoid this, I burn even more gas to get there and pay extra, but have found stations that still sell gas without ethanol. It's my choice as it should be for everyone.
 
Forgive me if this was already asked/answered, I just skimmed thread. But does this prove that the shut off electronic devices rule is BS? Why would it be safe to have ipads on in the cockpit but not in the cabin during takeoffs or do they power theirs down at that point. (Or has the rule changed, haven't been on a plane in a few years)

See my post just above yours. Operating electornic devices during take off and landing is safe, as long as the device has been tested and certified (I think even the FAA would need to get involved and bless it). Given that there are hundreds, if not thousands of devices, you can't test them all with all plane models, hence they request you shut down your device during take off and landing.
 
Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking, I just wanted to let you know that our arrival will be delayed by 15 minutes until the co-pilot and I finish up our game of Angry Birds.
 
I don't mind such things when consumers can make the choice but the government and certain tree-hugger groups want to force us all to do their bidding.

Recycling is a hassle and I stopped doing it. I don't like CFL compact florescent lamps. The light is too dim, is not the color I need and takes too long to turn on. I tried them and went back to instant-on incandescent lamps. I drive the largest SUV I could find because it's comfortable and we burn lights day and night so we can see. The government is forcing us to burn ethanol even though it reduces gas mileage by 8% and damages older engines. To avoid this, I burn even more gas to get there and pay extra, but have found stations that still sell gas without ethanol. It's my choice as it should be for everyone.

I hear you. I am sick and tired of all the government intrusion into people's lives. The war against smokers is the worst, if you ask me. Tax em, put labels on em, don't let people smoke em in bars. Enough! I started smoking just to protest this. I pay a lot to do so and don't feel good a lot but its my choice and I'm making my stand!
 
Some of you people have zero idea what you are talking about. Go learn about the thousands of electronics in a plane that keep it in the air before you B* about using iPads.

Anyway, I think the use of iPads is a good idea.
 
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