The Airline is Pulling Out All the Inflight Broadband Stops
Hawaiian Airlines is set to become the first major airline to provide free high-speed SpaceX Starlink internet service to passengers on their fleet of Airbus A330, A321neo, and incoming Boeing 787-9s. The jets fly routes between the Islands and the continental United States, Asia, and Oceania. The service won’t be available on their Boeing 717s, which operate short flights between the Islands.
“When we launch with Starlink we will have the best connectivity experience available in the air,” said Hawaiian Airlines President and CEO Peter Ingram. “We waited until technology caught up with our high standards for guest experience, but it will be worth the wait. Our guests can look forward to fast, seamless and free Wi-Fi to complement our award-winning onboard Hawaiian hospitality.”
SpaceX began launching their Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit back in 2019 to provide global high-speed, low-latency broadband internet, especially to rural and remote areas where connectivity is unreliable or completely non-existent.
Thus far, SpaceX has launched over 2,000 of the satellites, out of a planned constellation of up to 12,000, and they are currently awaiting approval from an international regulator to launch up to 30,000 more.
Starlink made headlines recently when Elon Musk and SpaceX sent Starlink terminals to Ukraine following Russia’s invasion, responding to a public cry for help from Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice prime minister and the country’s minister of digital transformation, as military operations caused significant disruptions across the country.
And it didn’t take long for the service to be up and running, providing internet independent of local infrastructure across the war-torn nation. By April 6, SpaceX had sent over 5,000 ground terminals to Ukraine, preventing Russia from cutting off the country’s communications. Starlink even resisted all hacking and jamming attempts by Russia, thereby earning high praise from the Pentagon for how well the service has performed in the electronic warfare domain.
“The way that Starlink was able to upgrade when a threat showed up, we need to be able to have that ability,” said Dave Tremper, Director of Electronic Warfare at the Office of the Secretary of Defense. “We have to be able to change our electromagnetic posture, to be able to change very dynamically what we’re trying to do without losing capability along the way.”
“Hawaiian Airlines is ensuring its passengers will experience high-speed internet the way we expect it in the 21st century, making hassles like downloading movies before takeoff a relic of the past,” said SpaceX Vice President of Starlink Commercial Sales Jonathan Hofeller.
“With Starlink, the inflight experience is greatly simplified so that once passengers step onboard the plane the internet works seamlessly throughout their flight. Soon, passengers will enjoy all the benefits of having the world’s best in-flight internet connectivity from the comfort of their seats.”
The airline claims, “Guests will be able to stream content, play games live with friends on the ground, work and collaborate in real-time, plan their Hawai‘i vacation, or share their special island moments on social media. Connecting to the internet will be seamless when guests walk on board, without registration pages or payment portals.”
Hawaiian will begin installing Starlinks on select aircraft next year.
