Hello, I'm on the plane

By Frank Barrett, Mail on Sunday

Last updated at 10:24 19 January 2004


One of the attractions of flying is that it's a period of enforced calm. Being on a plane means you are cut off from the rest of the world.

Admittedly some planes have credit card-operated satellite phones but unless you've recently scooped a rollover jackpot on the Lottery, you're unlikely to be using one.

No, when you're travelling by air your options are limited: eat, watch TV, eat, sleep, eat, read or eat (eating is probably favourite).

But enjoy this relaxed state of affairs while it continues - it won't last much longer. Within a year, aircraft will be making available wireless broadband connections on planes so that people can fire up their laptops and log on to the Internet.

Imagine half a cabin load of executives feverishly tapping away at their rattling keyboards for the duration of the flight!

And worse is to follow. If aircraft can now supply satellite-linked broadband connections for computers, what else do you think they will be able to offer? Yes, you've guessed it: a mobile phone service.

Once in the air, your mobile will be able to make and receive calls just as it does on the ground (although probably at three times the normal tariff).

You know how awful it is on a train when half-a-dozen people start having inane conversations - now envisage how it would be on a Boeing 747 with 500 people taking and making calls and all saying: 'We're over the Atlantic.'

I always thought that we weren't supposed to use mobile phones because it would disrupt the aircraft's avionics or something. Presumably this anxiety lasted only until airlines discovered that they might be able to make a fat profit from allowing people to use their mobile phones on board.

Will we be able to ask to be seated in a 'no-mobile-phone' or 'no-Internet' section? Or perhaps there will be entire 'phone-free' or 'Internet-free' flights when the rest of us can just sit and eat in peace.

Write to Frank Barrett, The Mail on Sunday, 2 Derry Street, Kensington, London W8 5TS, fax: 020 7938 2894, Send an e-mail

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