Flying on airlines in the past 10 days has been a challenge, with thousands of cancelled flights due to Covid-19. Cancelled flights in 2022 and beyond may be the norm rather than the exception, and it will have nothing to do with Covid-19.
On December 30 Airlines For America (A4A), a trade association of major U.S. airlines, sent an emergency petition to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) requesting a stay of 5G operations in a new band of spectrum, the C-Band, around certain airports. Wireless carriers such as AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, are scheduled to start using the C-Band on January 5, 2022.
The reason for the emergency stay request, according to A4A, is the airworthiness directive issued by the FAA earlier this month that states that aircraft will no longer be able to rely on their radio altimeters, a crucial component of their navigation systems that tells them how far they are above ground, in the presence of 5G transmitters in the C-Band.
The FAA is planning on instructing airlines to cancel or to reroute over 1,000 flights a day. That will “dislocate millions of passengers and airline crews” and “delay delivery of time-sensitive, critical shipments (including COVID-19 vaccines and tests),” according to the petition.
Covid-19-related airline cancellations of more than 1,000 flights daily have stranded countless passengers and have been front-page news for the past week. When large numbers of flights are canceled, the lives of ordinary Americans and the American economy as a whole are severely disrupted. No one expects the Covid-19-related cancellations of more than 1,000 flights per day to persist when the Omicron-variant subsides, perhaps as early as mid-January.
But after the Covid-19 challenges are overcome, the airlines will face the unrelated and potentially unending challenge of more than 1,000 daily flights canceled because of interference from the C-band. The economic harm of two weeks of 1,000 daily cancelled flights from Covid-19 will be minor in comparison to a longer-term stretch of cancelled flights from potential C-band interference.
About 135 airports are on A4A’s requested list, ranging from major airports such as John F. Kennedy International, Los Angeles International, and Chicago O’Hare, to small airports such as Worcester Regional in Massachusetts and Youngstown-Warren Regional in Ohio.
The FCC, as an independent agency, has the authority to allocate spectrum. Earlier in 2021 the FCC auctioned off licenses in the C-Band for 5G operations. Wireless companies spent over $90 billion for license in this spectrum band, about $80 billion paid to the U.S. Treasury and $13 billion to satellite companies.
The purchase of these licenses in this band of spectrum gave the wireless companies the right to deploy new 5G technology services and to sell those services to their customers.
However, as A4A points out, the airlines and the FAA have been saying for years that these transmissions would interfere with the operation of radio altimeters. A4A sent such comments to the FCC as early as May, 2018.
The A4A petition includes a letter sent by the Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation and the FAA Administrator, dated December 1, 2020. The letter states that “Harmful interference can interrupt or significantly degrade radar altimeter functions during critical phases of flight—precluding radar altimeter-based terrain alerts and low-visibility approach and landing operations.”
As I have explained elsewhere, safety concerns about 5G usage of the C-Band are not limited to the FAA. Canadian authorities, concerned about protecting radio altimeters, have restricted spectrum adjacent to the C-Band use near airports. The EU issued a safety advisory for European pilots landing aircraft in the United States specifically because of concerns about interference to radio altimeters
This battle over the spectrum will be one of the major challenges for the FCC in 2022. FCC Chair Rosenworcel could act on the petition immediately, and halt the deployment of 5G services planned for January 5, 2022. More likely, she would send the petition out for Notice and Comment, a process allowing the public to weigh in with their views. The wireless carriers may “volunteer” to reduce the usage of the C-Band until the issue is resolved, a time frame likely measured in years.
No one knows if or when or how the interference issue in the C-Band is resolved by the FCC. In the meantime, airline passengers will be watching announcements of flight delays and cancellations and wondering when the nightmare will end.
