AT&T, Verizon reject U.S. request to delay 5G wireless plans

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON (AP) — Verizon and AT&T have rejected a request by the U.S. government to delay the rollout of next-generation wireless technology.

A joint letter Sunday from the telecommunications giants to U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Steve Dickson, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, sought to dismiss concerns brought by U.S. airlines that a new 5G wireless service could harm aviation.

But Hans Vestberg, CEO of Verizon Communications, and John Stankey, CEO of AT&T, also wrote that they were willing to accept some temporary measures over the next six months to limit the service around certain airport runways.

Airlines had asked the Federal Communications Commission to delay this week’s scheduled 5G rollout, saying the service, set to launch Wednesday, could interfere with electronics that pilots rely on.



FILE - A China Airlines cargo jet lands at John F. Kennedy International Airport, Saturday, March 14, 2020, in New York. Verizon and AT&T have rejected a request by the U.S. government to delay the rollout of next-generation wireless technology. A joint letter Sunday, Jan. 2, 2022, from the telecommunications giants to U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, sought to dismiss concerns brought by U.S. airlines that a new 5G wireless service could harm aviation. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens, File)


Read more: https://apnews.com/article/technology-business-telecommunications-pete-buttigieg-steve-dickson-32012db9584d72ac624ec85a1694f3f6

[MLAA]

1. By all means place profit ahead of public safety.

Sarcasm

[Achilleaze]

2. What could possibly go wrong?

[Alexander Of Assyria]

3. Government experts are clashing with industry experts. M going with the taxpayer funded

experts.

Funny how article is framed as the industry having some kind of trump card over regulators…it’s other way around.

And the China Airlines photo adds what to the story? This more of a concern for Chinese airlines? Better photo would be one of a giant telecom tower with all the ant like surveillance protrusions.

Rejects is funny word when other side has the sledgehammers.

[abqtommy]

4. I've never voted to allow AT&T and Verizon to run our U.S. government. A pox on both

of them!

[JohnSJ]

5. Then the airlines have no choice but to ban cell phone use when people are flying until this issues

is resolved

[IronLionZion]

6. Or they could test it against aviation systems to make sure it's OK

It's already rolled out in many cities. My building has had 5G internet for 3 years. National Airport is nearby.

[James48]

18. It's only certain types of approaches that are affected.

There are a dozen different types of approaches using different kinds of equipment. A normal ILS approach, or a GPS approach generally is not using the type of equipment (radio altimeter) that is potentially affected.

The thing is- this was all proposed 7 YEARS ago, giving plenty of time for airlines to learn what was going to happen, and either re-equip planes with newer, tighter specification radar altimeter units, or to request and develop different kinds of approaches on those runways that were affected. Seven f’ing YEARS to get ready, and now, a month before it was set to switch over, NOW they are concerned. And the official winners of the spectrum were announced A YEAR ago, and could have prepared since then.

A day late and $80 BILLION dollars short. (The price the cellular carriers paid to use that spectrum. Airlines don’t want to pay a cent). https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/01/31/5g-spectrum-auction-bids-total-80point9-billion-winners-revealed-soon.html


The airlines were free to bid on the spectrum- but they decided not to. It’s been a year since the winners were declared, and everybody KNEW a year ago which airports and which approaches could be affected.

[Sgent]

7. The issue is

how much interference can airplane radar altimeters accept? Before this, the only signals on this band were from C-Band satellite, so very low signals. The 5G signals (and not all 5G signals are the same) will be much higher. The FAA alerted the FCC to possible interference before the auction, but the FAA (under Trump) auctioned the spectrum anyway. They use this spectrum in Europe and elsewhere, but not within X miles of airports.

The radar altimeters in the airplanes date back to the '60s, and although newer signals may be able to deal with the interference properly (if using newer instruments), no one has tested the older ones. This equipment is used to determine the distance to the ground when it is covered with fog / clouds / rain, and so its possible that the FAA could exclude class 2/3 landings which would mean no approaches with clouds lower than 400' assuming the instrument radio is still on station.

[MineralMan]

8. Why have they not tested the older equipment?

It's not like 5G was suddenly thrust upon them. It has been discussed for several years, and the frequency band it operates in has been known for a very long time. Testing should have been completed long ago.

[Sgent]

9. Mostly because

the airlines don't see it as their problem. They are flying using FCC certified equipment which is operating within spec. Their view is that it's the FCCs problem to recall it and if it interrupts flight interruptions to pay for it. The FCC could have put a sunset date on that equipment, but then it would have had to go through a rules making process that would have made it take longer to role out 5G or made it pay for the replacement out of the auction proceeds like happened with TV digital transition.

[MineralMan]

10. Yeah, well, the thing is that the FCC already approved 5G, knowing about

the nearby frequency usages. The altimeter equipment does not work on exactly the same frequencies, so there shouldn't be any interference. If the older altimeter equipment isn't designed with a narrow-enough bandwidth to reject the 5G signals, that should have been tested before the 5G stuff rolled out, not as it is being rolled out.

None of this was a secret. Not in any way. So, nobody tested the obsolete altimeter equipment against 5G signals. Now, as 5G is about to go online in its broadband format, that lack of testing is being revealed.

No excuses. This is not sudden news. It's been in the works for years.

[Sgent]

12. I kinda agree

the problem is that Dickerson will send air travel back to the 60's before he allows untested approaches (which he should). The FAA is rightfully going to treat any untested equipment as faulty and either the airplane owners, government, or carriers will have to pay, but it will drastically affect air travel especially during bad weather.

[MineralMan]

14. I blame the airlines on this one.

As I said, the band assignment was made years ago. Plenty of time to discover any possible issues with it during the open input period. I have no idea how many old altimeters might be affected. Maybe the airlines don't have any idea, either. They didn't check their equipment against 5G in all of that available time.

At those frequencies, most equipment operates with very, very narrow bandwidths. So, most likely, there won't be any interference in the first place. But they don't know, because they didn't check.

The cell phone carriers submitted their applications, which were approved. Now, they're about to throw the switch and enable the high-speed broadband 5G. The size of their investment in this is monumental. All the airlines have is "Well, it might interefere with our old obsolete equipment, maybe. We don't know, so the FCC should block this. Never mind that there has been all that time available for testing. We just didn't bother."

[Sgent]

16. The FCC is supposed

to warn license holders of possible interference and remediation steps to take. They didn't. In other countries, there has been a 400 MHz wide buffer, in ours there is only 200. It's also not only airlines, it's almost every airplane (including foreign carriers, general aviation, etc.) that operates in the US.

The FCC f'ed this one up, the FAA is limited in what they can do (issue NOTAM's).

[MineralMan]

19. I don't know that the FCC messed up.

There is a long comment period, during which the airlines could voice their concerns. Properly-designed equipment would reject any signals 200 MHz off frequency. That's a big enough buffer. And that was known during the initial announcement and before the comment period. There was ample time. Now, there is not. It is too late to raise objections at this point. Too much has been committed to the 5G launch in that band.

In any case, if updated equipment is needed, that, too, should have been ordered and installed ahead of the launch date. Like I said, there has been plenty of time and there were announcements of the planned band designation far in advance.

[CousinIT]

11. When there is corprat profit to be made, no lives matter.

Public safety is tossed in the shitter. How this is legal: regulatory capture (corporations own and control our regulatory bodies via revolving doors and other political schemes), and corporations also own and control congress. Thank the supreme court and citizens united for much of that.

Pfft.

In a sane country, this would be ILLEGAL.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

13. How is Fauci-Soros-Gates supposed to activated the vax nano-chips without 5G?

[Bengus81]

15. Yeah!! And dammit,I'm still waiting to become a magnetized like some idiot says happens when vaxxed

I've had three shots,how many do I need?

[MoriaeEncomium]

17. Don't worry once they get 5G up and running,

us vaccinated folk will be able to use the subspace portals.
We'll make those fuckers eyes water then, won't we?

Also what have we heard from other countries as to their
concern over avionics being affected by this new tech?

These deals always have the same smell.
Bought and paid for.

[DownriverDem]

20. Then again

my husband is a flip phone user and hates when folks tell him to get a smart phone. I got an android (Samson J7) through Consumer Cellular so we could get texts. I don't use it like a computer since I'm on my laptop most of the time. I'm not against technology, but don't want my phone to be joined at my hip.

[pecosbob]

21. I would blame both the FAA and the FCC (primarily the FCC)

We saw how Ajit Pai handled public comment on proposed rules. I suspect the telecoms made larger political donations than the airlines.

[Mawspam2]

22. The standards for 5G were set out many years ago...

...You can't tell me that Boeing and Airbus didn't have the ability to call up the cell carriers and FCC and work all of this out before now.

People complaining about this now are the same ones that told us that holding cells to your ear gives everyone brain cancer. Please point to the vast wards of people with brain cancer.