Saw this one coming! Think of the money the airlines will save by not having to install wireless access in the planes now.
Dell and Apple notebooks, according to a posted statement on Virgin Atlantic’s site, may only be carried on Virgin Atlantic flights if the battery has been removed and stored in carry-on luggage. Users lucky enough to sit in seats with power supplies may use the laptops via that external source, and Virgin will even provide plug adapters for them. Otherwise, the use of Dell and Apple laptops is prohibited. [Source]
Surely the Virgin Galactic flights will have wifi, tho.
They are not saying NO laptops, they are just saying No laptops with exploding Sony batteries. I don’t think that is all that unfair. I would prefer that anybody that has not returned the exploding batteries not use them on a plane that I am flying on.
I absolutely agree that it is a reasonable move on the airline’s part. I sure wouldn’t want to be at 30,000 feet with a cabin fire. Sony really flubbed in an inexcusable way here. What befuddles me is how these batteries ever made it to the consumer anyway. I have worked COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) and understand that to meet promises and stay profitable that things slip – “Oh, we’ll let the first 10,000 customers be our testers.” but these batteries conceptually made it through 3 difference company’s quality assurance processes!