Boeing Improves In-Flight Wireless With The Help Of Potatoes

If you’re going to take a stab at improving your in-flight wireless capabilities, then you’re going to need to test the signals. But when testing, you have to ensure that the plane is exactly the same as it would be 35,000 feet up in the air, which means you need passengers. Any travelers out there willing to sit still in a plane for a few days without ending up in an exotic destination? Didn’t think so.

Unsure of where they would find people willing to sit still for days on end in an airplane to endure wireless signal testing, Boeing engineers employed potato sacks instead. According to the Associated Press, because of their water content and chemistry, potatoes absorb and reflect radio waves in a very similar way to how people do. To fill their test planes the Boeing engineering team invested in 20,000 pounds of potatoes.

Those potatoes, plus the usual high-tech research and statistical analysis that Boeing is known for, resulted in a proprietary system for fine tuning Internet signals so that there would be a strong connection no matter where a laptop was in the plane.

Which means that next time you’re surfing the Internet above 10,000 feet, thank a potato.

[Image: jamonation]

US Airways inflight Wi-Fi service available on all A321 aircraft – with a freebie

After a brief introduction period, US Airways has become the next big airline to bring the Gogo Inflight Internet service to most of its planes. Starting this week, the service will be available on all US Airways Airbus A321 planes, and for the next seven days, access will be free of charge (June 1st – June 8 11:59pm)

When you board a Gogo enabled plane, you’ll see a Wi-Fi symbol next to the boarding door, as well as an instruction card in the seat pocket. Once the plane passes 10,000 feet (and the captain permits it), you can turn on your laptop, PDA, iPad or smartphone, and access the network.

After this week, access will cost $4.95 on flights up to 1 1/2 hours, $9.95 ($7.95 for small mobile devices) on flights up to 3 hours, and $12.95 ($7.95 for small mobile devices) on flights over 3 hours. On select flights, you’ll even be able to access the service up to 100 miles beyond the U.S. border.

To learn more about the service, how to connect, and where it’ll be available – check out the US Airways Gogo Inflight Internet page.

How to get free WiFi on your holiday flights!

One of the best innovations in travel over the past year has been the roll-out of wireless Internet access on flights. It has allowed us to check e-mail, get work done, and update our Facebook status, all at 35,000 feet. What cold be better? It truly is a wonder of modern technology on par with the Hubble Telescope and the Large Hadron Collider.

Fortunately, if you’re traveling this holiday season, there is a good chance you’ll get to test it out for yourself, and for no cost. Our pals over at Gizmodo have the scoop on how you can gain access to free inflight WiFi at least through the end of the year, thanks to some well timed promotional codes that may have been delivered by Santa himself.

According to Giz, the following codes will work through Dec. 31st. If you are flying Delta, then use DELTATRYGOGO, if you’re trip is booked with AirTran, then AIRTRANTRYGOGO should gain you access, and finally, if you’re on American Airlines, then give AATRYGOGO a shot. If for some reason you have issues with those codes, Gizmodo has a few other promotional codes , that are good through January 7, you can try as well. Travelers flying on Virgin America don’t even need a code at all, as they have partnered with Google to offer free inflight WiFi until January 15th.
And before you head out for the airport, be sure to check out Jaunted’s awesome Inflight WiFi Guide, which offers a quick and easy way of determining your chances of having Internet access on your upcoming trip and how much it’ll cost you if you do. Not all airlines have installed the service as of yet, and others are still rolling it out, so it’s nice to know ahead of time if it is even an option.

A big thank you to Gizmodo and Jaunted for sharing this information. It’ll definitely come in hand for many of us over the next few weeks.

Would you want to stay connected at 35,000 feet?

I remember how thrilled I was when wireless became so common place at airports, and although talked about for a few years now, it always surprised me how it hadn’t got onto flights yet. Little did I know that the Internet-on-flights saga has had its twists and turns.

Although never introduced on any American airlines, Internet has been on certain carriers since 2004. The broadband service was initially provided by a Boeing company called Connexion that shut down last year because it didn’t work out to be economically viable — not enough people were making use of broadband Internet in the air.

I suppose things have changed over the last three years and having wireless on aircrafts seems to have come back onto the agenda. From next week, JetBlue Airlines will start offering free email and instant messaging on the aircraft; American Airlines, Virgin America and Alaska Airlines plan to offer wider usage in the following months; and beginning 2008, all Lufthansa long-haul flights will have broadband.

Emirates seems to be leading the pack as it has maintained email and SMS services on its flights since 2004! You don’t even need a laptop, you can do it on a screen behind the seat in front of you. They even have in-seat phones that allow you to call anyone from the sky for US$5 a minute — on average 6,000 calls are made per month, basis which Emirates recently announced that it will be the first airline to allow mobile phone use on board.

Although some awesome material could be gathered from live in-the-sky-blogging, and even though there will be restrictions on connectivity, I don’t see how they would be able to stop people from disturbing others by speaking loudly on the phone or having cybersex through the web-cam. I’m not so sure anymore if I would want this in-flight option, would you?