Car GPS tracking on Independence of the Seas!

[cruzincurt]

 

One note about a GPS on a ship. I fried one a few years ago when I took it forward near the ray dome. Too much juice coming out of that dome for my little GPS to cope with.

 

 

What about our brains?

[TPKeller]

Every airline I've been on has a GPS listed as an "approved electronic device". I had one turned on sitting next to a window on a flight from IAH to MIA. I was told to turn it off per FAA reg. I quickly opended the airline's magazine and showed the flamboyant flight attendant that it was indeed an approved device.

 

He quickly produced an Official FAA Manual (with the page dog-eared) and gayly quipped that he "goes by a different set of rules".

 

He obviously had that discussion before. I turned my GPS off and waited for the return flight to play. Never had another person question it since.

Wow. You can bet that I would have had that guy's name in a letter to the president of the airline almost before we landed. I can't stand when low-level employees "make up" their own rules. If he makes up his own rules for this, what else is he making up rules for? This is the sort of thing that makes the legal departments of large companies cringe. Rules are there for a reason, not to be disregarded at whim, by either the passengers or the airline crew!

 

Now because of the nature of this particular incident, the PILOT has the ultimate say in what you may or may not do during the flight. He would have to come up with a pretty good reason to override the company's written and published policies though.

 

Theron

[TPKeller]

What about our brains?

There are strict rules about allowing people up on the antenna mounts to do painting, maintenance, etc, while the radars are hot.

 

On military ships, you can quite easily kill someone. They are not allowed to radiate some of the radars while in port at all. Of course, they have radars that do a little more than look for rain and ships nearby.

 

Theron

[cruzincurt]

There are strict rules about allowing people up on the antenna mounts to do painting, maintenance, etc, while the radars are hot.

 

On military ships, you can quite easily kill someone. They are not allowed to radiate some of the radars while in port at all. Of course, they have radars that do a little more than look for rain and ships nearby.

 

Theron

Any truth to the old story that microwave ovens came about because a technician walked in front of a radar dish and his candy bar melted in his pocket?:eek:

[gcuecruise]

My wife uses a Garmin watch for running. I told her if she had it on the cruise it would look like she was running, for example, 30 mph and then when she makes the turnaround it might look like 20 mph, but going the opposite direction she is running. Kind of fun.

[MrsFixitCT]

Another fun one...go to Google Maps, and get directions from LA to China...

 

Check out instructions #15, 28 and 86. :D

 

Someone at Google has a sense of humor. :D:D:D

[iluvcruzin]

I used my Magellan when we cruised down the Mississippi. It was interesting as it was dark and hard to figure out what towns we were passing without one.

[gcuecruise]

Another fun one...go to Google Maps, and get directions from LA to China...

 

Check out instructions #15, 28 and 86. :D

 

Someone at Google has a sense of humor. :D:D:D

 

Indeed....funny....thanks.

[BillOh]

I seem to recall ship's position, speed, direction of travel, and wind speed being available on the cabin TV.

 

On most ships, as of May 1-8 that part of the computer system on Allure wasn't working yet. Anyone update that?

[BillOh]

Wow. You can bet that I would have had that guy's name in a letter to the president of the airline almost before we landed. I can't stand when low-level employees "make up" their own rules. If he makes up his own rules for this, what else is he making up rules for? This is the sort of thing that makes the legal departments of large companies cringe. Rules are there for a reason, not to be disregarded at whim, by either the passengers or the airline crew!

 

Theron

 

Its a battle you can't win. If all else fails they pull the old parental, "because I said so" and then you can be charged with interference. Many flight attendants are that educated on electronics and can't identify some type of devices and in a pinch go to the most restrictive interpretation. I recently saw a show on one channel, I believe it was the Science Channel attempting to determine what types of consumer electronics radiate what type of energy and if it could be measured on a plane. It was different, but they didn't try to quantify how strong a signal would have to be to cause any problems. That would be hard to qualify and could be pretty dynamic.

 

However, since most airlines are now trying to offer internet and on board phone services, aircraft manufacturers must be more conscious of RF sensitivity of their equipment, but at least if they provide it they can test it more thorougly.

 

I also found on a fairly new Airbus type plane that they have cell phone detectors on board. On a recent flight I thought I had turned my phone off, but didn't hold the off button long enough. When they made the usual call to turn stuff off I didn't pay much attention, but 5 minutes later they came on the PA and said they detected someone still had one on. In my almost non-chalant re-check, I found out it was me and turned it off.

[TBone2K]

When we went on Sovereign out of Port Canaveral a couple of years ago, they confiscated my dad's GPS. He wasn't even bringing it on purpose, he just had it in his backpack, which he normally uses for his sailing gear. It was a marine GPS too, so would have been interesting to see what was actually "out there".

 

I guess nowadays, they might worry about that less since everyone's cell phone seems to have GPS capbility.

[TPKeller]

Any truth to the old story that microwave ovens came about because a technician walked in front of a radar dish and his candy bar melted in his pocket?:eek:

Indeed, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_oven#History:

 

The specific heating effect of a beam of high-power microwaves was discovered accidentally in 1945, shortly after high-powered microwave radar transmitters were developed and widely disseminated by the Allies of World War II, using magnetron technology. Percy Spencer, an American self-taught engineer from Howland, Maine, was working at the time building magnetrons for radar sets, with the American company Raytheon. He was working on an active radar set when he noticed that a Mr. Goodbar he had in his pocket started to melt. The radar had melted his chocolate bar with microwaves. The first food to be deliberately cooked with Spencer's microwave was popcorn, and the second was an egg, which exploded in the face of one of the experimenters.[3][4] To verify his finding, Spencer created a high density electromagnetic field by feeding microwave power from a magnetron into a metal box from which it had no way to escape. When food was placed in the box with the microwave energy, the temperature of the food rose rapidly.

 

Theron

[TPKeller]

When we went on Sovereign out of Port Canaveral a couple of years ago, they confiscated my dad's GPS. He wasn't even bringing it on purpose, he just had it in his backpack, which he normally uses for his sailing gear. It was a marine GPS too, so would have been interesting to see what was actually "out there".

 

I guess nowadays, they might worry about that less since everyone's cell phone seems to have GPS capbility.

I have never heard of anyone confiscating or disallowing possession of a GPS before, other than on a secure government facility.

 

What was the reason given? How come this is not widely reported?

 

Theron

[TPKeller]

Its a battle you can't win. If all else fails they pull the old parental, "because I said so" and then you can be charged with interference. Many flight attendants are that educated on electronics and can't identify some type of devices and in a pinch go to the most restrictive interpretation...

I would counter with "it's a battle you can't win on the plane." And you should not try, because as you note, you can now be charged with a crime.

 

But there are other kinds of "win." You take names and you take notes on what happened, and when you get home, you appeal to those in charge. If a low level employee is giving direction counter to a written airline policy (published in a magazine for the customers to see), you can bet someone is going to be unhappy about it.

 

This is most likely going to be a case of "no harm, no foul", because nobody really cares if you can read your GPS during a flight, but in other real-world situations, that is what you can, and have to do when you encounter such incidents. You have to submit to their authority at the time... then if the "foul" is bad enough, you sue them, take the court-ordered award, and go on a nice cruise! :)

 

Theron

[freeruthie]

If you have a gps that saves your tracks, you can put them on google earth and see where you have been.

[Universe93B]

Took my Garmin 62s on Allure of the Seas, and was able to get 4-5 bars on the balcony and 3-4 bars inside the room, even all the way to the bathroom. Even with all the metal on the ship, I was impressed to easily and quickly get a lock on the satellites. I am truly impressed. I've tried out other handheld GPS on many cruises and all of them had trouble.

 

I also got a good trial on some trails at our ports in Costa Maya and Cozumel. It got a little roughed up, screen is pretty scratch resistant. It stayed out on the balcony for most of the time.

 

 

[isdoo]

I seem to recall ship's position, speed, direction of travel, and wind speed being available on the cabin TV.

 

This is not always accurate.

 

On our last cruise it was way out.