[aklug] Re: wireless on airlines

i'm thinking the wireless used by aircraft will be on different
infrastructure than for
cell phones. just as fixed wireless is. the cell bases it to pass the
connection from
station to station as the aircraft moves.

-----Original Message-----
From: aklug-bounce@aklug.org [mailto:aklug-bounce@aklug.org] On Behalf
Of Mike Tibor
Sent: Friday, November 13, 2009 6:34 AM
To: aklug@aklug.org
Subject: [aklug] Re: wireless on airlines

On Thu, 12 Nov 2009, Jenkinson, John P (SAIC) wrote:

> it seems like airlines have two methods of providing customer
wireless.=20
> satellite which is expensive to add to the plane, and cell based=20
> wireless which is cheaper, but not good for flying over water or wher=20
> cell based infrastructure is sparce.

I've never actually tried to get a cell signal in the air, but my guess
is=20
you'd be lucky to get any signal at all from the air.

Generally speaking, the goal of the antenna coverage of a cell site is
not=20
to reach out as far as possible which is usually the case with most
radio=20
transmissions--it's actually to *limit* the footprint. Usually this is=20
done by angling the antennas down several degrees. With the antennas of

most cell sites angled down like that, you most likely wouldn't get any=20
usable signal from the air.

The reason for limiting the footprint is because the larger the
footprint=20
of a single site, the more customer phones are going to 'register' with=20
that site at any given time. But you want your customers spread out=20
fairly uniformly over all your cell sites, so you start limiting the=20
footprint of your most heavily loaded sites, and then locating new sites

nearby.

Mike
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Received on Fri Nov 13 09:57:53 2009