If cell phone calls from airplanes aren't possible, how did passengers call during 9/11 attacks?

So what technology were these passengers using then?

• MIRACLES AND WONDERS Last week, USA Today reported a joint effort between Qualcomm and American Airlines' to allow passengers to make cellphone calls from aircraft in flight.
• According to the story, the satellite-based system employs a "Pico cell" to act as a small cellular tower.
• Connection is impossible at altitudes over 8000 feet or speeds in excess of 230 mph.
• Yet despite this, passengers Todd Beamer, Mark Bingham, Jeremy Glick and Edward Felt all managed to place calls from Flight 93 on the morning of September 11.
• Peter Hanson, en route to Disneyland with his wife and daughter, phoned his dad from Flight 175.
• Madeline Amy Sweeney, a flight attendant, made a very dramatic call from Flight 11 as it sped to the North Tower.
• Barbara Olson made two calls, collect, to her husband at his government office from Flight 77 as it made its way to the Pentagon.
• Olson was an easy candidate for Airfone (one doesn't call collect from a cell), but as the stories developed, Olson---and Felt---were said to have called from inside locked lavatories.
• Satam Al-Suqami's indestructible passport, for one, is currently under the microscope in the Reverse Engineering Department at Area 51.
• Likewise, professional bowlers could benefit from inquiries into whatever physical force brought about the collapse of WTC 7.
• And as a frequent flyer who finds long-term parking difficult and expensive, I'd like to know by what mechanism Mohammed Atta got to Portland, ME, where he was videotaped boarding a flight to Logan Airport in Boston.
• Who would've thought there'd be a silver lining even in the debris cloud made that Tuesday morning?