There’s nothing like the feeling of getting off a long haul flight and finding out some major news event has occured. Virgin Australia is lessening this ‘netlag’ experience by today announcing inflight WiFi has been switched on for passengers travelling between Sydney and Los Angeles.
Virgin Australia are now the only Australian airline to offer international WiFi, allowing their customers to remain connected to their family, friends, favourite TV shows or the news for the duration of their flight.
The launch of inflight wifi is in response to research conducted by Virgin Australia which found that more than 70% of passengers felt they could be more productive during long haul flights by remaining connected to WiFi, with three quarters saying their flight would be more enjoyable with WiFi.
Dr Andrew Campbell, Cyberpsychologist at The University of Sydney says
We know that the inability to keep up-to-date with the online world and stay in touch with friends is a real fear that’s only grown since the introduction of smartphones. Like it or not, staying connected has become an essential part of life for most of us and certainly seems to be where we’re headed as a society.
Virgin Australia says that they now have inflight WiFi on all five of their Boeing 777 aircraft, with 10 Boeing 737 aircraft fitted out as well. Virgin Australia further plans to expand inflight WiFi to 75% of their Boeing 737 aircraft by the end of the year, with their A330-200 aircraft to be fitted out in early 2019.
I was offline for 11 days (it was great) and the only thing I missed was Stephen Hawking passing.
Long flights are the perfect time to get some reading time in, or watch any decent movies you missed. I can see the business case for it, but most people will use this for instagram/FB and messaging.