Delta announces plans to equip their entire fleet of more than 330 aircraft with in-flight WiFi service to be available in first and economy classes by Summer 2009. The Aircell Gogo service will run $9.95 or $12.95 for trips under or over three hours, respectively, and will allow connection of any WiFi enabled device.
Tag Archive for 'WiFi'
Inflight Online news reports on progress being made by two big names in passenger broadband. Aircell which is rolling out the Gogo in-flight WiFi services has secured additional funding that will be used to keep the company afloat during the roll-out of their service. Panasonic has announced VT iDirect as the source of the satellite IP router technology that will be used for their Ku-band satellite broadband service, eXConnect, expected to launch in the first half of next year.
Engadget reports that American Airlines will be testing the Gogo in-flight WiFi service on unspecified round-trip flight from New York’s JFK and Los Angeles’ LAX beginning on June 25. The service will be free for passengers during the testing, but will eventually run users $12.95 for flights greater than three hours and $9.95 for trips under that threshold.
The Wall Street Journal’s technology columnist Walt Mossberg takes a test flight on a business jet equipped with Aircell’s Gogo in-flight WiFi service to give the service a test run. It is a data only service and he used Dell and Apple laptops, a BlackBerry, a Windows Mobile phone and an iPhone (all WifI equipped) to perform all the most common online tasks.
Gogo launches in 2008, likely in July, on select flights on American Airlines and later in the year on Virgin America. The Gogo service will cost a flat fee of $12.95 for flights of three hours or longer, and $9.95 for shorter trips.
JetBlue’s in-flight WiFi service started with only allowing passengers to check email via Yahoo Mail or BlackBerry Mail or chat with friends via Yahoo Messenger but that limited service is being expanded to include email via Gmail, AOL Mail, Hotmail and Windows Live Mail. JetBlue has also partnered with Amazon.com to offer a customized in-flight version of Amazon.com for shopping.
A CNET News blog post reports that iPass is partnering with AirCell’s Gogo service to include in-flight Internet service as part of iPass’ WiFi roaming connectivity. iPass provides mobile Internet access for a monthly fee. Users can connect via WiFi, dial-up or Ethernet using a single user password in hotels, Internet cafes, airports, and now with this partnership, in-flight.
The post also speculates that as there are other WiFi aggregators, such as Boingo, out there the Gogo service may be adding additional partnerships in the future.
Heard it on BOL #724.
via CNET
This email from a BOL listener was read on the Buzz Out Loud podcast #714…
Dear Buzzards,
I was in the cockpit over the eastern U.S. the other day and decided to take out my laptop and look up some technical data on the 737 I was flying. At the unnamed American Airline I fly for we have recently begun carrying our manuals in digital format. When I booted up I noticed that wireless networks were available. This is quite common and is usually someone’s laptop in the cabin. Just out of curiosity, however, I opened up the Wi-Fi window and saw that the signal was from an aircraft with Wi-Fi service that was flying just above and ahead of us. I knew it was from that airplane because the signal identified itself as being from a particular U.S. airline, (which will also remain unnamed), that has Wi-Fi service and we heard their call sign on our frequency. That got me thinking about the proposed balloon network you talked about a while back and I was wondering if you couldn’t come up with an airline mesh network. Our airline alone has more than 2,500 flights a day and the sky is always packed with airliners. Have you ever had to sit in the air an extra hour in a holding pattern because there were too many airplanes in a given block of airspace ahead of you? ATC is always having to speed up, slow down and vector traffic to maintain legal separation. If all those airliners were equipped to create a mesh network you could easily defer the cost of the equipment as well as compensate the airlines for the service. It might even help keep travel costs down. Maybe it’s silly but it seems as valid an idea as balloons.
Keep up the good work,
Vic the Texas Pilot Rancher
Too bad its probably a long shot for a mesh network like that to become a reality.
