Alaska Airlines to test Wi-fi service on flights

You know that important email from your boss that you couldn’t get to in time because you were on an airplane crusing at 35,000 feet? Soon you might not have that excuse. Alaska Airlines plans to test out wireless internet service on flights starting in Spring 2008.

The technology will provide customers with a unique entertainment and business network at 35,000 feet. Passengers with Wi-Fi-enabled devices, such as laptop computers, PDAs, smartphones and portable gaming systems, will have high-speed access to the Internet, e-mail, virtual private networks and stored inflight entertainment content.

Unlike air-to-ground services, Row 44’s satellite-based system is designed to function over land, water and across international borders, enabling service throughout Alaska’s route system in Alaska, the Lower 48 states, Hawaii, Canada and Mexico.

There is no word on how much this will cost travelers but I’m hoping it is prohibitively expensive. In a world where we are all connected to computers and handheld devices 24 hours a day, it is kind of nice to take a seat on an airplane and to get away from it all.

It also means we are moving one step closer to the use of cell phones on planes, which in my mind will be the official beginning of the end.