The Airborne Internet

Abstract

Mobile communications and internet access are increasingly becoming an essential part of people's lives in today's information society. The growing interest by commercial airlines in providing internet access and cellular connectivity in the passenger cabin has lead to the emergence in recent years of the first satellite-based inflight connectivity providers, including Connexion by Boeing (now defunct), OnAir, AeroMobile, and Panasonic Avionics Corporation. Given the long range of transcontinental air travel, a satellite communications link is the most natural and flexible way to keep the aircraft connected to the ground throughout the flight. Long-distance flights typically traverse oceanic and remote airspace, e.g., large bodies of water, deserts, polar regions, etc., where no communications infrastructure can be deployed on the ground. However, direct air-to-ground (A2G) cellular networks are being deployed (e.g., AirCell in the United States) to provide faster and cheaper access during continental flight. This Chapter presents the vision of the Airborne Internet, a new paradigm for inflight connectivity based on the concept of mesh networking (Akyildiz & Wang, 2005). Airborne mesh networks are self-organizing wireless networks formed by aircraft via direct air-to-air (A2A) radio communication links. Such networks have so far been considered mainly in the context of military aviation (DirecNet, 2007; Bibb Cain et al., 2003). The concept of the Airborne Internet was first proposed at NASA Langley Research Center's Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) Planning Conference in 1999. In one conference session, it was suggested that such a system would require a peer-to-peer communications network among the aircraft. The Airborne Internet Consortium (AIC) formed subsequently to promote and aid in the development of such a system. Consortium members include Aerosat, C3D Aero, and United Airlines. As shown in Fig. 1, aeronautical mesh networking is envisioned as a means to extend the coverage of A2G access networks offshore to oceanic or remote airspace. By enabling aircraft themselves to act as network routers, an airborne mesh network is formed in the sky, as illustrated in Fig. 2. At any given time, only a fraction of all aircraft are within direct A2G coverage, as they fly over the ground infrastructure deployed on shore. During oceanic flight, the aircraft can stay connected by using the airborne mesh network as a bridge to the ground infrastructure, thus bypassing the costly satellite link. From an airline’s perspective, avoiding the satellite link can result in significantly reduced communication costs. Another potential benefit is reduced latency compared to a geostationary satellite, enabling delay-sensitive applications such as voice and video conferencing. With a geostationary