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BBC World goes "live" on Emirates Airlines...

but how? (November 2003)

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JI
jimyvr
quick excerpt from Dubai-based Emirates Airlines' Press Release, issued on Nov 15, 2003, about its US$8million investment on upgrading inflight entertainment system

Quote:
NOVEMBER 15, 2003

EMIRATES’ NEW $8 MILLION SYSTEM OFFERS CUSTOMERS WIDEST CHOICE OF ENTERTAINMENT IN THE SKIES

Its new $8 million ice (information, communication and entertainment) system available from next month will feature 100 movies and 50 TV channels on demand, 350-plus audio channels and 40 in-flight games - three times more than on any other airline.

The award-winning Dubai-based carrier is launching the industry’s most sophisticated on-demand video and audio system, making it the first to show BBC World news updates in flight, and first to give travellers wanting to stay in touch with home or office a means to send and receive email and SMS from any seat . . . for just $1 a time....

...The seatback screens provide updates on the progress of the flight, information on Emirates, Dubai and the Skywards loyalty programme and the latest BBC headlines, updated via a live link to BBC World. Emirates also has upgraded its traditional Airshow moving map, and added a second channel.


Does anyone know how will BBC World be able to broadcast "live updates" throughout the flight when the plane is flying all over the world?
JA
Jakarta
I don't know how this would work but I do believe that you can watch CNNi live on Singapore Airlines and also on jetBlue (a US no-frills airline) passengers can watch live digital television from their seat so the technology is not new.
AD
Adam
Perhaps they have a satellite dish which automaticly points in the right direction?
CW
cwathen Founding member
Quote:
Perhaps they have a satellite dish which automaticly points in the right direction?

Picking up a satellite is like trying to look at a 60 watt lightbulb from here to space; the dish must be accurately aligned or you will get nothing. I know of no motorised dish technology which can automatically maintain line of sight all the time whilst mounted on an object moving as fast as a plane does, and a dish which could compensate for the the plane moving away from the satellite long enough for it to be corrected would be larger than the plane itself.

Even if all this could be resolved, you can only pick up satellites on the visible horizon, at some point on a long-haul flight they would need to change to a different satellite.

i am intrigued to know how they are doing this though. A radio link?
GA
Gareth Founding member
Won't the system be similar to the on board telephones which you can use from anywhere (that's if you read the instructions correctly).

Live footage will be alot better than the re-hashed/pre-recorded stuff the likes of KLM use at the start of the flight.

Gareth
NG
noggin Founding member
I suspect thay they will be using a compressed, low data rate signal (which will probably look OK on the low resolution LCD seat back TVs used in airlines) and transmit this as data.

Satellite transmissions are already routinely received in planes - GPS positioning information, INMARSAT style satellite phones etc. are all currently used. With the correct combination of clever aerial design (electronic or mechanic steering etc.) and transmission scheme it should be possible - though not cheap. (I suspect they are using a different style of satellite transmission to that used for conventional digital satellite TV though)

Using a terrestrial radio link is far less likely - the network of transmitters would need to be huge - and as planes spend a lot of time over large areas of water they'd need to build transmitters on ships?!
:-(
A former member
Look North (Newcastle) featured a demonstration of this system on a flight out of Newcastle Airport recently.

This is how it works.
AN
andyrew Founding member
I'm not sure if this is related, but Boeing Connexion is rolling out it's broadband internet connections for aircraft in early 2004. The Emerates press release doesn't say BBC World news will be live, just the latest, via a live link to BBC World.... i.e. BBC World will e-mail, FTP or something!!! EDIT: Oops, just read above!!


From the Boeing Website:
Quote:
What types of services are offered through Connexion by Boeing? Connexion by Boeing is a common carrier service available to all aircraft passengers. The services provided on the carrier include:

Real-time, two-way open access to the Internet
Real-time, two-way access to company intranets
Live e-mail
Premium television and radio
Airline and destination information
Shopping
Television
Crew information services


Lufthansa and BA have been running tests on the system for almost a year now. I would guess over the next couple of years we may see a revolution in In Flight Entertainment.
NU
The Nurse
Crikey, I was impressed when I discovered you could watch live telly on the HSS ferry from Holyhead to Dublin!

I still don't know how that works.
BB
BBC unTALENT
They (Emirates) have a great inflight entertainment system... I loved the facility where you could play games against other players and at the end it would list all of the high scores next to their nicnames and their seat numbers...
:-(
A former member
How can Emirates claim to be the first airline to have BBC World news inflight? BA has been running pre-recorded updates for ages.
I think the only way Emirates could run live broadcasts would be using the technology developed by Boeing Connexion for the broadband internet service using geo-stationary satellites to transmit the data to the aircraft which are fitted with two antennae.
:-(
A former member
the Boeing connexion service allows broadband internet and live television broadcasting by uploading it to the plane in the air from a Beoing server on the ground. There is a 100kg antenna mounted on top of the plane. you could find out moeron www.connexionbyboeing.com

They called it Beoing proprietary phased array receive and transmit anntenna which allows instant and continuous connecions between satellites and aircraft.

The antenna was originally developed inthe 80s for the US Air Force to beam signals comparable to an office internet connection/

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