Les avions d’American airlines ont bien possédé des cabines téléphoniques. Le service a été supprimé à partir de 2003 car jugé peu rentable par la compagnie sur ses vols intérieurs.
on a pu téléphoner qu’après 2004 :
Aviation Week (07/20/04) described this new technology in an authoritative report published in July 2004 :
« Qualcomm and American Airlines are exploring [July 2004] ways for passengers to use commercial cell phones inflight for air-to-ground communication. In a recent 2-hr. proof-of-concept flight, representatives from government and the media used commercial Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) third-generation cell phones to place and receive calls and text messages from friends on the ground.
For the test flight from Dallas-Fort Worth, the aircraft was equipped with an antenna in the front and rear of the cabin to transmit cell phone calls to a small in-cabin CDMA cellular base station. This »pico cell« transmitted cell phone calls from the aircraft via a Globalstar satellite to the worldwide terrestrial phone network »
Needless to say, neither the service, nor the « third generation » hardware, nor the « Picco cell »CDMA base station inside the cabin (which so to speak mimics a cell phone communication tower inside the plane) were available on the morning of September 11, 2001.