Air France passengers can send SMS on board

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Air France has become one of the first airlines in the world to allow the use of mobile phones on board aircraft to send SMS and MMS during international flights. The service testing period will extend for six months.

A statement from the company indicates that for the time being this possibility is only accessible in one of the Airbus A318s at the service of the company, which covers European routes. If passengers’ mobile phones have an Internet connection, the company also allows users to access their mailbox.

This offer is possible thanks to the Mobile OnAir system, which allows the equipment to be connected to a device placed on board the aircraft, which, via a modem, sends communications to a satellite before they are forwarded to an earth station.

The tariffs for this service are comparable to those applied by operators when the customer is outside the country of origin, Air France said.

It seems that this is only the first step of the company that, in the future, intends to extend the service to other types of mobile communications, namely telephone calls.

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