US: ‘No smoking’ also applies to e-cigarettes on flights, court says

Vaping is smoking, a federal appeals court ruled, upholding regulation that adds e-cigarettes to an existing ban on the use of traditional tobacco-burning products on commercial flights in the US. The decision Friday by the Washington-based court leaves in place the DoT’s new rule barring e-cigarettes in flight to protect people from the devices’ second-hand vapour. The prohibition announced last year applies to scheduled airlines, charter operators and foreign carriers flying to or from the US. The court’s decision came with a whiff of uncertainty as the 2-judge majority struggled to reconcile regulations dating back decades with the modern-day technology. The lone dissenting judge accused his colleagues of manufacturing ambiguity about what it means to smoke. <br/>