Qantas CEO Alan Joyce today announced the airline’s trial deployment of internet capability on selected A380 aircraft starting in February next year.
Six aircraft would be involved in the pilot program on designated Sydney-Los Angeles and Melbourne-Los Angeles flights.
“From February next year our customers travelling between Australia and Los Angeles will have the opportunity to participate in our inflight connectivity trial and communicate online from the 35,000ft,” Joyce said.
“Our customers will be able to access the internet via their wi-fi enabled personal electronic devices, such as iPhones, iPads and Blackberrys, on Qantas for the first time.”
The service uses Inmarsat’s SwiftBroadband and global satellite based connections to transfer data between the passengers in the aircraft to the ground.
The trail will initially be rolled out to first and business class travelers, and forms parts of Qantas’s evaluation of connectivity options, including the ‘Q Streaming’ trial set to start in January.
Q Streaming uses wireless technology to connect customers to the On Demand inflight entertainment system via wi-fi enabled devices.
