The spectre of WiFi on all flights means that society will soon have no “respite” from phones and has “totally” lost the ability to disconnect, commentator Brenda Power has warned. 

Today, EasyJet announced that WiFi will be rolled out across all planes in its fleet between 2027 and 2028. 

It means that the sky, one of the last refugees from the buzz of messages and social media notifications, has fallen to the internet. 

On The Claire Byrne Show, Brenda Power said this is a development that she views with sincere regret. 

“It was always your best, your only respite from being constantly on call, constantly accessible,” she argued. 

“You would actually disconnect and be in the moment and also, I suppose, with everybody else on the plane, you were all in the same boat, you were reading a book, maybe you were watching a movie, 

“But you were all present; now, everybody's going to be taking calls and answering emails.” 

Ms Power continued that it means that society has now “totally” lost the ability to say they were simply not available for a few brief hours. 

“That has to bring its own stress,” she said. 

“Because even if you're flying off on holidays, you're going away for a weekend break, you're still going to be accessible to work-related issues and stresses. 

“And that is bound to impinge on what should really be your winding down time.”

Irish airlines

No Irish airline has yet to roll out WiFi across all its flights. 

Aer Lingus has installed Elon Musk’s Starlink on planes that fly long haul routes; however, there is no date yet for when it will be available for passengers on short-haul flights. 

While Michael O’Leary got into a public spat with Musk this year when he said he had no intention of installing StarLink on Ryanair, citing cost. 

Musk responded by branding Mr O’Leary an “utter idiot”.

Main image: A Ryanair plane. Picture by: Alamy.com.