Filed under: airlines news, cheap flights, main | Tags: Alaska, Business, news, Science, Technology, travel
Alaska Airlines is the latest carrier to launch in-flight Wi-Fi, offering passengers on a specially equipped Boeing 737 a service that uses satellites instead of cellular towers to connect the plane to the Internet.
The service was to begin a 60-day trial run on Thursday with a flight between Seattle and San Jose, California, the airline said. Wi-Fi will be free on board at the beginning of the trial, and the airline plans to use customer feedback to determine future pricing. At the end of the test, Alaska will determine its schedule for rolling out the service across its fleet. The airline serves more than 90 cities in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.
Most major U.S. airlines are either testing in-flight Wi-Fi or offering it commercially on some planes. Most have chosen Aircell’s Gogo system, which links the onboard Wi-Fi network to the Internet over specialized EV-DO (Evolution-Data Optimized) towers on the ground. Alaska, which routes many of its flights over water and wilderness, is using a satellite-based system from Row 44.
Like other airlines, Alaska won’t let passengers talk over VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol) while in flight. They are invited to surf the Web, send and receive e-mail and instant messages, access games and multimedia content and use corporate VPNs (virtual private networks). Users can access the network with any Wi-Fi device, including phones and portable media players. They will get an opening Web page with news, music, shopping and links to services on the airline’s homepage.
Row 44’s system, which uses leased satellite transponders with coverage across North America, delivers about 4MB bps (bits per second) to the plane from the satellite and at least 256K bps from the plane. That is shared among all users of the Wi-Fi service, although not all users are likely to be sending or receiving data at all times.
Alaska and Southwest Airlines, both Row 44 customers, had said they would begin trials last year, but both formally announced their test launches this month. The deployments were held up by typical logistical and development delays, as well as delays caused by the holiday travel season, said Wendy Campanella, Row 44’s director of business development. The service is operating on a temporary license from the U.S. Federal Communications Commission but is in the final stages of getting a permanent license, she said.
The current wave of in-flight Wi-Fi rollouts, announced over the past two years, are taking shape amid tough times for the airline industry as businesses and consumers cut back on spending. The cost of the deployments needs to be balanced by enough passengers buying an added-cost service, said analyst Jack Gold of J.Gold Associates.
“Those formulas may not be looking as good as they did six months ago,” Gold said. In most cases, in-flight Wi-Fi costs about $10 or more per flight. In today’s economy, “It’s not a sure thing at all,” he said. Several trial deployments have been delayed.
Southwest announced Feb. 10 it had installed the system on one plane and would equip two more by early March. The budget airline is partnering with Yahoo to offer a homepage featuring a flight tracker and content that is relevant to passengers’ destinations.
Two Russian military bombers came close to breaching northern Canadian airspace on the eve of U.S. President Barack Obama’s visit here last week, Defence Minister Peter MacKay revealed yesterday.
The Russians’ behaviour drew a rebuke from Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who said he was concerned about what he called encroachment into Canadian territory.
“This is a real concern to us,” Mr. Harper said during a visit to Saskatoon. “I have expressed at various times the deep concern our government has with increasingly aggressive Russian actions around the globe and Russian intrusions into our airspace.”
He vowed to “respond every time the Russians make any kind of intrusion on the sovereignty of Canada’s Arctic.”
The incident occurred Feb. 18, about 24 hours before Mr. Obama travelled to Canada for his first foreign visit.
Canadian CF-18 fighter jets were scrambled from Cold Lake, Alta., to intercept the long-range Tupolev TU-95s and signal them to back off, Mr. MacKay told reporters in Ottawa.
The Defence Minister noted that the Russian flight took place when Canada’s security focus was on Ottawa, in preparation for the Obama visit.
“I am not going to stand here and accuse the Russians of having deliberately done this during the presidential visit, but it was a strong coincidence,” Mr. MacKay said.
Canadian jets intercepted the Russian aircraft – commonly referred to as “Bears” – 190 kilometres northeast of Tuktoyaktuk, NWT. They had not entered Canadian airspace but did stray into a zone of international airspace under Canada’s monitoring and control.
The Russian embassy did not return phone calls yesterday.
Mr. MacKay said Canadian pilots sent their Russian counterparts “a strong signal that they should back off and stay out of our airspace.”
Mr. MacKay said this incident was one of an increasing number of exercises by Russian military planes near northern Canadian and U.S. airspace in recent years.
It’s a resumption of the probing Cold-War-era training flights by Russian aircraft that were suspended when the Soviet Union fell. But in 2007, flush with money from high oil prices, the Russians resumed regular air exercises in the name of protecting the sovereignty of their Arctic.
Opposition parties accused the Tories of using tough talk on Russia to shift the political debate away from mounting deficits and economic woes.
“Everything the government does in these circumstances is an effort to change the channel,” Liberal MP Bob Rae said.
U.S. General Gene Renuart, commander of North American Aerospace Defence Command, said Canadian and U.S. jets have visually identified more than 20 Russian aircraft in recent years that were conducting exercises near North American airspace.
Mr. MacKay said the Russians have turned a deaf ear to his request for advance notice of such near incursions.
“It’s not a game at all … I have personally asked both the Russian ambassador and my counterpart [in Russia] that we are given a heads up when this type of air traffic is to occur, and to date we have not received that kind of notice.”
Gen. Renuart said, however, that Russia has not broken international rules or entered the internal airspace zones of Canada or the United States.
“The Russians have conducted themselves professionally; they have maintained compliance with the international rules of airspace sovereignty and have not entered the internal airspace of either of the countries.”
Filed under: airlines news, cheap flights, main | Tags: air travel, flights, Los Angeles, Melbourne, news, travel, Virgins
Today Virgin Blue’s new long-haul carrier, V Australia, is due to formally launch operations with an inaugural departure from Sydney bound for Los Angeles.
Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson and Virgin Blue CEO Brett Godfrey are travelling on the first flight, which is being operated by a Boeing 777-300ER. V Australia has six of the type on order and is sourcing a seventh on lease from International Lease Finance (ILFC).
Speaking during a media event at Sydney Airport to mark the launch, Branson said: “What we are trying to do is to offer the best quality aircraft, product and service. I think that will make V Australia one of the most successful airlines in the world.”
Godfrey added: “Nine years ago we set out to shake up and change the Australian domestic market and now it’s ground hog day with the long-haul market. We’re coming in offering what we believe is the best product in all three classes across the Pacific.”
Transport minister Anthony Albanese also attended the briefing. He said that the new route is a direct result of an amended Australia-USA open skies agreement.
The new carrier, which secured its air operator’s certificate on 19 February, was originally due to start operations on 15 December but the launch was delayed after Boeing’s machinists’ strike postponed the delivery of its first aircraft.
V Australia will initially offer thrice-weekly services between Sydney and Los Angeles but will boost the route to daily on 21 March. Thrice-weekly Brisbane-Los Angeles flights are due to join V Australia’s network on 8 April and a thrice-weekly Melbourne-Los Angeles service will follow on 15 September. Five weekly Sydney-Johannesburg flights are next in line and are due for launch in October.
Branson is flying around the world in eight days to demonstrate the Virgin network’s new-found global connectivity.
Etihad Airways and Dla Piper have partnered to sponsor some of the UAE’s most promising law students from the Al Ain University to compete at the internationally acclaimed Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition 2009 to be held in Washington D.C., USA.
The UAE University Team was presented with Etihad flights to the competition along with a cheque from Dla Piper to cover their accommodation and expenses in the USA at a presentation ceremony held at national airline’s new head office complex in Abu Dhabi.
David Church, Regional Managing Partner of Dla Piper Middle East said, ‘We are delighted to sponsor the Law Team again this year. They have shown enormous enthusiasm and appreciation in their whole approach, including the training sessions which we have run for them with our lawyers. As for our legal consultants, they have generously given their time and expertise to coach the students for six full days in the art of litigation and international arbitration.’
Etihad Airways has provided the five Emirati students and two law professors from the UAE University in Al Ain with return tickets to New York, for the competition.
James Hogan, Etihad Airways’ chief executive said, ‘Etihad Airways is fully committed to Emiratisation and has comprehensive cadet pilot, graduate manager and engineer trainee schemes and therefore we are thrilled to support the law students as they represent the UAE in the moot court competition next month.’
The Dean of the College of Shari’a and Law at the UAE University, Professor Jassem al Shamsi approached DLA Piper to be the exclusive legal sponsor of the UAE Law Team participating in the competition.
Commenting on the legal sponsorship, Professor Jassem al Shamsi said, ‘We approached DLA Piper for sponsorship for a second year as they have demonstrated a strong commitment to the UAE and the Middle East and to empowering local talents.’
He added, ‘We have benefited from the expertise of DLA Piper’s lawyers as they have provided our students with six full days training in Mooting practice both in Arabic and English. We are therefore looking forward to a better performance this year.’
Sponsorship of the UAE University Law Team forms part of an ongoing programme of CSR activities DLA Piper is undertaking and represents the company’s commitment to unlocking local talent and attracting Emiratis to work in the private sector.
Through its sponsorship of the UAE University Law Team DLA Piper’s legal consultants have helped to train the aspiring university law students in the art of litigation and prepare them for a mock court case in which they will compete against other top international law students. In addition, the Washington office of DLA Piper has invited the Team for a visit to their offices to meet with young trainee lawyers and experience first hand how a leading US Law firm operates.
The Philip C Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition, now in its 50th year, is the world’s largest moot court competition, with participants from over 500 law schools in more than 80 countries.
The competition is a simulation of a fictional dispute between countries before the International Court of Justice. Thousands of law students from around the world will compete in international rounds between March 22 – 27, 2009 at the Fairmont Hotel in Washington DC, USA.
Each team is required to prepare oral and written pleadings arguing both the applicant and respondent positions of the case, judged by an elite corps of volunteer attorneys.
Filed under: airlines news, cheap flights, main | Tags: air travel, Brazil, Business, flights, Israel, news, travel
Israel’s El Al Airlines is announcing nonstop flights to Brazil that the company’s president says will help build a “bridge between Latin America and the 
Holy Land.”
El Al President Haim Romano says the company’s first-ever regular flights between Latin America and Israel will be launched on May 2.
A Boeing 700-220 will fly three times a week between Israel and Sao Paulo, with connecting flights to Argentina, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador and Uruguay, Romano said in a statement released Friday in Sao Paulo.
