American Airlines has announced it will team up with AirCell to test in-flight internet across the United States beginning in 2008. The test will be conducted on their Boeing 767-200 aircraft that mainly fly transcontinental service, and if successful…will be extended to other aircraft.
The service will include nationwide in-flight service, usable via wi-fi connections, and a variety of unique content. The cost of the service on American will be announced at the time of rollout.
Alliance partner Qantas will be adding in-flight internet to its upcoming Airbus A380 aircraft and retrofit its Boeing 747-400 aircraft provided by On Air.
Bandwidth is a concern…as it will be shared amongst passengers. For example, users of the Qantas system will have to share 432 kilobits per second. With an Airbus 380 with 550 passengers…all using Internet would get downloads of about 256 bytes per second…not exactly broadband…Of course, not everyone will use the internet…but still…
