Wi-Fi on Airlines
by David Barth, written May 5, 2008
From page 30 of May 2008,issue of Wired.
At the time of this writing four US carriers were ramping up to provide Wi-Fi during flight. There are two methods
of providing Wi-Fi:
- The most promising Wi-Fi system is satellite-based broadband from a California company by the name of Row
44 that provides about 30 Mbps per plane from a satellite in geosynchronous orbit at 22,500 miles above the earth’s
surface. The bandwidth is shared among passengers on a plane, so the more who are logged on, the slower the
throughput for each. Initially, the service will be available only above North America, but the facility can
easily be migrated to geosynchronous satellites around the earth to provide global Wi-Fi. Installation costs
are higher that the cellular system (described below), but passenger cost will be less, proposed to be as little
as $6 per flight. Theoretically, this service could be used on the ground except that the bandwidth provided by
each satellite would be too narrow to service more than a few dozen persons. Each airline that subscribes to
this service will probably have discrete access.
- The other aircraft Wi-Fi system is transmitted from 92 existing cellular towers for coverage of the
continental US. Because the towers are transmitting line-of-sight (LOS) to an aircraft, each transmitting tower
would have an effective radius of 250 miles. When an aircraft flew to the edge of one tower’s radius, another
tower along the flight path would begin providing service to the aircraft. The bandwidth would be only 3Mbps
for each aircraft, and the cost could be around $12.50 per flight.
Alaska and Southwest have opted to use the satellite-based system. American and Virgin are using the cellular
system. Obviously, international flights could only be served by the satellite-based system. Being able to check
email during long flights could be a boon to travelers on oceanic trips.