If airports and hotels can offer travelers access to the Internet, why not airplanes?
Internet in the sky might arrive sooner than you think.
Airlines in Europe, Asia and the Middle East already are offering Internet access in flight. People in the business say it's only a matter of time before cash-strapped U.S. airlines catch up.
"The airlines that don't have it will be the odd ones," predicts Bill Thompson, vice president of corporate sales and distribution with Connexion by Boeing, a division of Boeing Co. and the industry leader in high-speed in-flight Internet access. In three to five years, Thompson says, having the option of checking e-mail in the air should be as routine as putting up your tray table before landing.
Thompson was in Charlotte last week for a speech at the Duke Homestead off Queens Road, where he talked about the service to members of international chambers of commerce based in Charlotte. He was there at the invitation of Lufthansa, which offers on-board wireless Internet on its daily flight between Charlotte and Munich, Germany, in a service it calls "FlyNet."
Although Internet availability has spread quickly in the last decade, it's been slower to reach airplanes, largely because of technology development and regulatory approvals.
U.S. airlines have been slower than others to install the service, mostly because of financial troubles. In 2001, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines announced a partnership to install Internet access aboard 1,500 planes. But after the 9-11 attacks, they put the project on hold because of more pressing financial issues.
Using transmitters placed in planes, Boeing's system relays signals to a satellite, which links into service providers on the ground. Passengers can then use their laptops to check e-mail, surf the Web or tap into their company's computer network in real time.
Boeing's system is available on 10 airlines, and company officials say it's as fast as a digital subscriber line (DSL) in your home. It costs $29.95 for unlimited use on flights over six hours, or less for shorter flights.
Other companies also are working on Internet access, although most of them use air-to-ground technology instead of air-to-satellite. That means that the connection is not in real time, and e-mails gather in a cache that is refreshed when the plane passes over a transmitter. United said this month it plans to offer such a service in conjunction with Verizon Airfone aboard Boeing 757s, pending regulatory approval.
Winning approval from many different countries also has been tricky, Thompson said. Lufthansa told Boeing it wanted to offer the service on flights between Frankfurt and Iran.
"We said, 'Oh, this should be easy: an American company getting permission to operate the Internet over Tehran,' " he joked. Yet they won the permission.
The service targets mostly business passengers, many of whom hate being unproductive on long flights, or returning to inboxes filled with unanswered e-mails. Lufthansa officials say about 30 percent of passengers from Charlotte use the service.
Company officials say the Internet opens plenty of other possibilities, too, such as participating in a videoconference, making phone calls and downloading movies.
"There are a lot of things beyond surfing the Net the Internet gives you," said David Friedman, Connexion by Boeing's vice president of marketing. "It gives you the freedom to do what you want to do."
Former WSOC-TV anchor Bill Walker, speaking at the Duke Homestead event last week, said he had the poor fortune of traveling to Europe the night of the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship Game in April. As a Tar Heel fan, he hated to miss the game.
But because he was flying Lufthansa, he said, he was able to check the score with the help of another passenger -- and found out the Tar Heels won before his plane landed in Germany.
Friedman said he couldn't say when the first U.S. airline would sign on, though he said Connexion by Boeing is in "serious discussions" with several carriers.
But if high-paying business customers want it, odds are it'll happen soon.
