Reserve life before cell phones
#12
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Its cute you think there were RAPS. You were on all 24 hours a day, 19 or 20 days a month. 2 hours to report. You could be called at midnight to start a 12 hour night.
#13
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This, mostly.
RAPs became a thing after the Whitlow Letter, which was issued in late 2000. Someone had taken it upon themselves to ask the FAA if sitting on-call was an obligation to the Company, and if it was, how could it not be considered duty for the purposes of a duty day.
Whitlow, who was the Deputy Chief Counsel for the FAA at the time said (obviously paraphrasing) "Hey, you know what, you're right. You can't consider time on call as rest. You either need to be given rest prior to the report time of the assignment, or the assignment must fit within the duty day including the on call period".
Needless to say, this seriously blew up the reserve deal as it then existed for the airlines, which was pretty much 24 hour on call, be there in an hour (or whatever your contract said) and it caught them pretty flat footed.
Portable cell phones (to distingush from car phones) really didnt become a serious consumer item until the late 80s. Widespread consumer phones appeared probably about 1990 or so, and you saw the adoption of the classic Motorola "brick" phone running on the old cellular AMPS system (analog). Consumer grade car phones running on the cellular system had been around a few years prior to that, and before the cellular system, a different system (VHF/UHF, straight analog) had been around for car phones going back to the early 60's, but it was nothing like the cellular system, and certainly not consumer grade in any way.
"True" one number service for cell phones, where if you dialed the cell phone number you got the phone where ever it was, didn't really materialize until the late 90s. Before that, you had to call an operator, and "guess" where the phone might be, and they had to try to signal the phone based on your guess. Otherwise it went to voice mail. Yea, it worked, but by and large, cell phones were mostly for being "local".
Beepers have been around for decades, and there were various flavors. "Digital" beepers, where you could enter a call back number started in the 80s, but before that there were the very simple variety that simply beeped, and you either called the answering service (back when that was a thing) or the office that had your number.
Prior to that, yea, 24 hour reserve sat by the phone. Have a loud ringer (which was an acutal bell), and maybe if you were big news, you had a phone out on the porch or garage. Remember, at that time, all phones were landlines, and hardwired. Ma Bell (old school American Telephone & Telegraph) ran the show, owned everything including the lines and the phones, and you had to lease the phones directly from them. They were heavy and built to last by Western Electric (Bell's manufacturing arm). Wireless phones started to appear in the early 80's.
RAPs became a thing after the Whitlow Letter, which was issued in late 2000. Someone had taken it upon themselves to ask the FAA if sitting on-call was an obligation to the Company, and if it was, how could it not be considered duty for the purposes of a duty day.
Whitlow, who was the Deputy Chief Counsel for the FAA at the time said (obviously paraphrasing) "Hey, you know what, you're right. You can't consider time on call as rest. You either need to be given rest prior to the report time of the assignment, or the assignment must fit within the duty day including the on call period".
Needless to say, this seriously blew up the reserve deal as it then existed for the airlines, which was pretty much 24 hour on call, be there in an hour (or whatever your contract said) and it caught them pretty flat footed.
Portable cell phones (to distingush from car phones) really didnt become a serious consumer item until the late 80s. Widespread consumer phones appeared probably about 1990 or so, and you saw the adoption of the classic Motorola "brick" phone running on the old cellular AMPS system (analog). Consumer grade car phones running on the cellular system had been around a few years prior to that, and before the cellular system, a different system (VHF/UHF, straight analog) had been around for car phones going back to the early 60's, but it was nothing like the cellular system, and certainly not consumer grade in any way.
"True" one number service for cell phones, where if you dialed the cell phone number you got the phone where ever it was, didn't really materialize until the late 90s. Before that, you had to call an operator, and "guess" where the phone might be, and they had to try to signal the phone based on your guess. Otherwise it went to voice mail. Yea, it worked, but by and large, cell phones were mostly for being "local".
Beepers have been around for decades, and there were various flavors. "Digital" beepers, where you could enter a call back number started in the 80s, but before that there were the very simple variety that simply beeped, and you either called the answering service (back when that was a thing) or the office that had your number.
Prior to that, yea, 24 hour reserve sat by the phone. Have a loud ringer (which was an acutal bell), and maybe if you were big news, you had a phone out on the porch or garage. Remember, at that time, all phones were landlines, and hardwired. Ma Bell (old school American Telephone & Telegraph) ran the show, owned everything including the lines and the phones, and you had to lease the phones directly from them. They were heavy and built to last by Western Electric (Bell's manufacturing arm). Wireless phones started to appear in the early 80's.
the text messaging pagers helped a lot too.
#14
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great explanation but timeline is off a bit. Had a brick cellphone (size of a chalkboard eraser) that worked everywhere I tried it going back to the mid 80's. By the late 80's very early 90's it was pocket size Nokia's. By late 92 it was flip-phones. 2004 ish was the razor. It pretty much stayed that way with just improving coverage until 2007 and the iPhone.
the text messaging pagers helped a lot too.
the text messaging pagers helped a lot too.
#15
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A pager was the key to life! The old Bob Newhart show had a neighbor named Howard who was a airline pilot on reserve. He had a phone with a 100 foot long cord. He is always carrying it around on the show. They were really a thing. Pilots in apartments would have cords as long as 200 feet so they could sit by the pool.
#16
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A pager was the key to life! The old Bob Newhart show had a neighbor named Howard who was a airline pilot on reserve. He had a phone with a 100 foot long cord. He is always carrying it around on the show. They were really a thing. Pilots in apartments would have cords as long as 200 feet so they could sit by the pool.
I started with USAir in 1989. I remember having a pager for the 1st year then switching to a cellphone.
#17
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Carrier pigeons. String with tin cans. Then there was Lassie to the rescue.
#18
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My grandpa was an airline pilot as well, he would go flying from the nearby GA airport when on reserve. He had a phone at his hangar, so he could hang out there. He would fly over his house every 20 minutes or so, and my grandma would put a white sheet in the backyard if scheduling had called. Not sure how long his call out times were then - this was in the 60’s to early 80’s.
#20
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Sure, you could get a brick phone in 1984, but it cost $12,000 in today’s money. And that’s just the phone.
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