Some Delta Air Lines 767s are offline following technical issues reported with the Viasat kit on board. A Delta spokesperson confirmed the outage to PaxEx.Aero:
We have temporarily disabled Wi-Fi equipment on select Boeing 767 aircraft while a technical issue is resolved. In partnership with our in-flight connectivity suppliers, we expect to have fast-streaming connectivity restored on all impacted aircraft by early May 2024. We apologize to our customers for any inconvenience this causes.
The outage comes just four months after the carrier began to activate the new system on its 767 fleet, part of the planned migration of most mainline aircraft to the Viasat inflight internet network.
This is, of course, not the first time an airline has been forced to disable the system on board due to technical issues. The 2Ku system caused troubles with the ELT antenna on some A330s, for example. A220s faced a similar problem in 2021. Viasat had to deinstall some 737s at EL AL in 2021 to avoid aircraft damage.
This time around the problem does not appear to require deinstalling the hardware, which is good news for the companies. But it will take a couple months to sort out a fix for the troubles. That’s not great news for passengers as Delta continues to market its fast, free Wi-Fi on board.
That the aircraft also operate some routes without coverage, owing to the ViaSat-3 F1 anomaly and associated launch delays is also not helping the situation. Viasat recently suggested the two additional satellites needed for global coverage would be launched by “early calendar year 2025.”
Viasat deferred to Delta for comments on the outage.
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