China's in-flight network milestones

Nov 15, 2011: An Air China flight provided a local-area network to passengers for the first time.

July 3, 2013: The first Chinese flight connected to the Internet via an L-band communication satellite completed a successful trial. The Civil Aviation Administration of China's chief, Li Jiaxiang, greeted Chinese micro-blog users with a mid-flight post.

April 16, 2014: The first Chinese flight equipped with air-to-ground communication technology successfully supported an in-flight, long-distance video conference.

March 10: A Xinhua News Agency reporter aboard flight CA1303 gave a live telecast on China's National People's Congress and the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultation Conference sessions. This was supported by KU-band satellite communication technology.

Sept 3: Passengers on CA1369 from Beijing to Sanya watched a live telecast of the military parade in Beijing. It was the first in-flight Internet trial supported by broadcast satellite.

China Daily

(China Daily Africa Weekly 10/09/2015 page20)