Trial Will Help Address 'Social And Etiquette Issues'

British carrier bmi has become the first British carrier to offer its passengers an inflight communications service including the use of SMS-enabled mobile phones and PDAs (personal digital assistants). It will also allow access to the internet and email from laptop computers fitted with GSM data cards... but won't allow voice calls, out of concern for passenger privacy issues.

The service, which is being supplied by OnAir, will be tested for six months on a single Airbus A320 aircraft operating between London Heathrow and Moscow. The UK launch follows the granting of telecommunications regulatory approval by Ofcom.

"We are delighted to be working with OnAir to make this service available to customers," said Peter Spencer, managing director of bmi. "It opens up an exciting new era of travellers being able to stay in touch by text message and email whilst in the air."

"Our research tells us that our business passengers in particular have two key concerns -- getting through the airport quickly and being able to carry on working during their journey, so we’re confident that many will warmly welcome this service.

"The trial will help us address some of the social and etiquette issues regarding the use of mobile communications devices inflight and provide valuable customer feedback which will be at the heart of deciding how the service is developed and rolled out across the remainder of our mid haul fleet. We have chosen not to implement the voice call option as part of the trial."

Benoit Debains, chief executive of OnAir, added, "With the start of bmi’s trial, Mobile OnAir is now flying on two airlines in Europe, making OnAir the leading provider of inflight passenger communications services. Mobile OnAir is the only service today which offers SwiftBroadband and it has already flown to 53 cities in 24 countries in Europe and North Africa."

Mobile OnAir uses satellite communications technology from Inmarsat, SwiftBroadband, for high speed air-to-ground communications. Mobile phones and GPRS devices can be used on any aircraft equipped with the OnAir equipment. The passenger’s device connects to the OnAir system via a mini-base station on the aircraft, based around a picocell, which picks up signals from PDAs and phones and sends them to a satellite. From there they go to OnAir’s ground network, then out to the public network.

The OnAir technology can allow up to 12 simultaneous calls per picocell, as well as unlimited SMS text messages and emails. If required, further picocells can be added, increasing the number of simultaneous calls.

FMI: www.flybmi.com, www.onair.aero