Elon Musk’s SpaceX has inked a key deal with Qatar Airways, latest reports say. According to the media reports, the agreement is regarding WiFi connectivity to the passengers flying with Qatar Airways. Soon, Musk‘s Starlink will offer free WiFi to all Qatar flyers. The deal says that the WiFi connectivity will have speed up to 350 Mbps. This is a win-win deal for the flyers as the WiFi connectivity would come at no additional cost with a better download rate.
Currently, Super WiFi service provides internet at the speed of 10 Mbps in the sky. But with this deal, flyers would get to experience real broadband speed. The officials of Qatar Airways have reportedly said that once the deal is activated, its flyers would get smooth, ultra-fast internet. This means that flyers will get to enjoy gaming, OTT streaming even VPN access in the flight.
Last week, SpaceX’s formidable Falcon Heavy rocket achieved a successful launch on Friday morning, carrying a NASA mission destined for a distant asteroid. This mission, named after the asteroid Psyche, involves a spacecraft approximately the size of a tennis court embarking on a nearly six-year, 2.2 billion-mile journey to reach the planetary body by July 2029. NASA’s objective is to examine the composition of Psyche, which is characterized as “an unusual object likely rich in metal.” The Psyche spacecraft is equipped with an array of scientific instruments designed to study the asteroid’s magnetic field and chemical composition.
The Psyche mission is projected to incur an estimated expenditure of approximately $1.2 billion, covering development and operational costs. As part of this total, NASA has granted SpaceX a contract of around $131 million for the launch of the mission. This mission represents SpaceX’s eighth utilization of its Falcon Heavy rocket, the company’s most potent launch vehicle currently in operation. Notably, SpaceX successfully retrieved and intends to reuse the rocket’s twin side boosters for upcoming launches.
