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Comment by roel_v | Hacker News Reader

I flew Emirates last week, and the preflight announcement about electronic devices said use of all devices was ok, except Galaxy Note 7 which need to stay turned off during the whole flight. I can't imagine much worse PR, when yoir products are routinely called out by neutral third parties for being an actual hazard source.

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It was also mentioned on my recent flights in the USA and Europe on various OW airlines as well. Heck even in pre-boarding announcements at the gates. Really not the publicity you want.

I've flown 25k miles in the last three weeks across 5 countries.

Every airline mentioned this. American, Japan Airlines, Dragonair, Cathay Pacific, Etihad, JetBlue and Southwest.

I wonder if it's too late to short Samsung.

Pun intended?

probably not too late, seeing as an investor suggesting a re-org caused stock to go up on the same day this issue was announced.

I bet acquisition department is on fire.

Do you mind if I inquire what your career is? I would love a technology-related job that allows me to travel like that.

Most of that was vacation followed by a week of domestic work travel when I got back.

Just travel. Focusing on travel-related jobs is not a great goal. Focus on highly rewarding work, and pay your fares.

I second this. Work trips are very different from personal travel, and much less fun than people assume. A well paying job with generous vacation time (real vacation, not "available via email" vacations) is better, in my opinion.

I had a job that involved a lot of travel back in the day. I worked for a telecoms installing unix workstations and oracle servers for planning radio networks (calculating signal strength per frequency over terrain and subscriber maps). I loved it, but it's not for everyone. Long periods on your own, sometimes in locked-down societies like Saudi Arabia. I ended up playing a _lot_ of Civilization 2. Still I got to go to Tanzania, South Africa, Bangladesh, Japan and lots of countries in Europe and the Middle East and occasionally got to do sight seeing at weekends. Not so great once you're married with kids.

It’s the same thing in Europe, Lufthansa, Easyjet, …

I did not hear it on my last four flights across Europe with Lufthansa last week.

Hm … I flew pretty much exactly two weeks ago in a couple Airbus A320 every damn airline seems to use to fly across Europe (I flew e.g. Amsterdam to Frankfurt). I wonder if that’s a recent change (to no longer mention the Note) or they just say it on certain flights (which to me would make little sense).

And this thing was supposedly off when it started smoking:

"Green said that he had powered down the phone as requested by the flight crew and put it in his pocket when it began smoking."

What's the remedy here? All Galaxy Notes in the airtight metal box until we land?

Removable batteries. A quaint little feature we've had since the first 'portable' brick phones. No one needs a device to be razor thin.

If the phone was powered down, it looks like this might be a chemical reaction in the batteries. Taking it out might just remove barriers between the source of combustion and flamables in the environment.

First I'm surprised Al Queda doesn't use a special OS or a virus to make phones explode on a plane. Second, it could be competitors who specifically target the Note 7 with a 0-day attack to harm Samsung's reputation.

All phones with a battery are a fire hazard if they get the wrong OS.

The battery itself has a controller to prevent overcharging. I very much doubt the OS can override that.

This is dangerously wrong.

True, all airlines I used last week had such a warning, to turn it off for the whole time on board of the airplane, even while still on ground.

One of the airlines last week shorted the warning to "Samsung 7 phone".

Bad PR for Samsung.

I can confirm flydubai and indigo have also said the warning, maybe ICAO recommended it?

Wow that's amazing. I'd love to hear a recording of that.

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