Major airlines say the 5G doomsday scenario is over (for now)

Following on from a story I posted a few days ago, Airline executives have now breathed a sigh of relief to their investors saying they believe the threat to their operations from the rollout of 5G technology is now behind them.

Although AT&T and Verizon have agreed only to temporarily delay 5G deployment at major airports, the CEOs of American and United both said there will now be a resolution of the dispute without thousands of delayed, diverted or canceled flights. They had been predicting those dire consequences earlier this week.

"It's taken a while to get to the right spot, but I feel like we're in the right spot," said Doug Parker, the CEO of American Airlines. "I don't think you're going to see any material disruption going forward because of this."

"While I wish it happened earlier, the good news is we now have everyone engaged, the FAA and DOT at the highest levels, the ... aircraft manufacturers, airlines and the telecoms," said Scott Kirby, the United CEO. "While we don't have a final resolution quite yet, I'm confident we'll get there."

The Federal Communications Commission auctioned off the C-band spectrum to U.S. wireless carriers last year — an $81 billion sale that would allow them to provide robust — and lucrative — 5G service. But the airlines soon started screaming that use of that technology near airports could interfere with aircraft radar altimeters, an instrument that tells pilots how high their plane is off the ground. Altimeters are crucial for landing airplanes in low-visibility conditions.

That could have meant widespread, continual and costly schedule disruptions — perhaps delaying tens of thousands of flights a year. It could have costs billions of dollars to the industry that has lost tens of billions in the last two years due to the pandemic.

Canceled or delayed flights, no matter the cause, are costly. Just two weeks of disruptions during the recent holiday travel season caused by lack of staff due to omicron cases and bad weather cost Delta $80 million. This had the potential to create schedule disruptions unlike anything seen in decades.

After a couple of temporary 5G service delays, the White House and the telecoms this week reached a deal to delay the rollout of the technology near airports until there can be a consensus on how to address the potential problem.

The telecom companies sounded less than pleased with the truce.

"We are frustrated by the FAA's inability to do what nearly 40 countries have done, which is to safely deploy 5G technology without disrupting aviation services, and we urge it do so in a timely manner," AT&T spokesperson Megan Ketterer.

Aircraft flying in Australian airspace are safe from the impacts of 5G signals on aircraft safety systems for the moment with no indications of problems that have been uncovered in the US.

Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has been closely monitoring the issue and so far has seen no evidence 5G transmissions are currently affecting aircraft.

Last year US airlines and aircraft manufacturers raised serious concerns that a segment of the airwaves to be used by American telecommunications companies for 5G is too close to that utilized by radio altimeters that measure an aircraft’s clearance height over terrain.

This would impact aircraft systems such as automatic landings, wind shear prediction and terrain warnings.

According to a CASA statement, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau has had “no reports of radio altimeter incidents linked to 5G since the telecommunications technology rolled out 2 years ago.”

One of the key differences between Australia’s 5G and that of the US is the transmissions currently do not extend into the part of the spectrum worrying the US aviation industry CASA said.

Aircraft radio altimeters operate in 4.2-4.4Ghz range and the 5G transmissions subject to the interference debate are in the adjacent 3.7-4.2GHz spectrum. According to CASA Australian 5G transmissions currently top out at 3.7GHz, well below the radio altimeter frequencies.