Honeywell Working To Connect Airplanes To The Internet

By Heather van Blokland
Published: Thursday, September 28, 2017 - 8:53am
Updated: Friday, September 29, 2017 - 11:11am

Technology in the air is behind technology on the ground, at least when it comes to the internet. But in-flight connectivity is no longer on stand-by.

“If you have internet at home, you just expect connectivity everywhere. People expect the same thing on an airplane. The problem is with an airplane, it’s at least 10 years behind,” said Curt Gray, Senior Director, Honeywell Aerospace.

Gray is working on a project to get military, corporate and commercial aircraft fully connected to the internet. 

He said a continuous streaming internet is much harder to put in place in the air than in a home. The issue is continually tracking satellites while flying at 500 miles per hour and at 40,000 feet.

“Laws of physics get in the way as far as being able to track the satellite at going .8-mach,” Gray said.

In the last year, Gray said technology has become available to put high speed internet in place in the air. Corporate and military aircraft have been outfitted with the software to connect at high speeds.

Passenger airplanes are next.

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