phil94028

I got an "trip details" email for a flight next week Westbount which stated as below. It sounded like aircraft not equipped rather than deferred MX.
Is this normal for this route and equipment?

Even ancient United 777-200s on the route the wifi sometimes works.

Wi-Fi Will Not Be Available On Your Upcoming Flight

Unfortunately, Wi-Fi won’t be available on your next flight, but we’re continuing to enhance our onboard experience. You’ll still be able to enjoy your favorite movies, shows and more on your seatback screen. We apologize in advance for the inconvenience.

GagaPilot

I had the same “not available” message westbound TPAC a few weeks ago and was able to purchase WiFi onboard. I’m flying TPAC back eastbound tonight and received the same message. Curious if I’ll be able to purchase again.

ND76

I wish they would stop promoting "free Wifi" as if it were available systemwide. They are going to be looked at by state attorneys general for consumer fraud at some point.

Mountain Explorer

Every promotion I've heard or read on this subject uses the words "We're on a journey to offer free wi-fi on every flight".

Unless there's an AG out there who somehow doesn't know the difference between journey and destination, I don't think they have anything to worry about

planetmans

If you are on an A330neo that has Viasat wifi installed, you won't have wifi while over the pacific because Viasat does not have coverage over the pacific currently.

Personally I think it is very shortsighted of Delta to start retrofitting A330neos with Viasat before they have coverage over the pacific. Delta could instead focus on retrofitting the A330ceo fleet with Viasat because I don't believe that fleet operates any transpacific at all at the moment. Viasat has coverage over the Atlantic and Europe which is the majority of the routes the A330ceo fleet operates, so the impact would be minimized.

Just another thing to add to the list of reasons to hate Delta's A330neo fleet (I do realize wifi has nothing to do with the airframe itself, but Delta's choice of the A330neo instead of the 787 is a pet peeve of mine.)

Mountain Explorer

Delta is focused on the long term goal of upgrading the entire fleet asap, rather than the short term inconvenience of the transition. I think that's the opposite of short sighted.

planetmans

​​​​​You're right that the end result will be great once Viasat fixes their issues, but until then you have to understand the frustration of someone who mainly flies TPAC routes on this equipment. I'm not saying to put the whole thing on hold until Viasat has coverage, just focus retrofitting fleet types that wouldn't be affected by Viasat's dead zones as much such as the A330ceo that mainly flies to Europe. Delta hasn't retrofitted any of the A350s that were originally delivered to Delta, I would imagine that they realize retrofitting an A350 with Viasat would make the system basically useless for the majority of the flights the A350 fleet operates.

​​​​​​
​​​

ClipperDelta

The majority of A330NEOs are used on more transatlantic and US transcon routes than on transpacific routes today; in fact, I see at least 12 A339s being deployed on TATL and JFK-LAX today vs 5 on TPAC.

Of all TPAC flights operating today, only 5 are on the A339s; the other 9 to 11 (two of them don’t operate daily) are using either A359s or 763s.

xliioper

Viasat-3 F3 (APAC) is supposed to launch in 4th quarter 2024. Although it sounds like it will be moved to replace F1 (Americas) which is only going to operate at 10% of capacity due to antenna deployment issues (although 200 - 300 megabits quoted below is only .02% - .03% of 1 Terabit/second -- 10% would be 100 Gigabits/second). Presumably, the F1 satellite will be moved to cover APAC region.

https://spacenews.com/viasat-prepari...t-3-satellite/

phil94028

Thanks all. Must have been an excellent Viasat sales pitch to DL!
Sounds like they are a real mess with the big birds.

Clearly this is not the best way to do it with cross linking of the Starlink fleet coming online!

MCO Flyer

The F1 satellite will be operational effective in June over the Americas. While it’s capacity has been reduced thanks to the Antenna malfunction, it should start providing some WiFi coverage on TPAC routes to at least Alaska (and finally Hawaii). Beyond that will have to wait until the new Asia sector ViaSat 3 satellite launches next year.

https://spacenews.com/viasat-prepari...t-3-satellite/

xliioper

Your SpaceNews link is the same one I posted at the bottom of my original post that you quoted.

autdi

Worst instances of this I've encountered were on 752, the seatback pocket has the free wifi card, in every seat, and only paid wifi on board. For the longest time I'd been flying 752 ATL-MCI and it had been free, encountering a long string that wasn't especially on 5 hour ATL-SNA trips is annoying.

chipbennett

Ran into exactly this on the 75S JFK-SFO / SFO-JFK last week.

phil94028

LAX-HND yesterday on an A330-900neo the wifi seemed to work for the whole flight. A little patchy. This was in spite of the "no wifi on your flight" preflight email and probably viasat setup.
The captain seemed to think that there was some dual mode capability on the aircraft setup for some but perhaps not all of the type. I think it is irritating for the augmented flight crew as well on their breaks.
It was priced in the $30 range with some kind of a carve out if you had an premium TMobile subscription.