Update: Most of the effected flights have been restored after an agreement to delay the 5G launch near airports.
Update: British Airways’ 777, Lufthansa 747-8, and Korean Air’s 747-8 and 777 flights to the US are being cancelled as well. Lufthansa 747-8s have been replaced with 747-400s, which apparently aren’t affected by 5G concerns, though they don’t have a first class cabin like the newer 747-8s.
In the meantime, United is blaming delays on some 777 routes on 5G signals. They instruct passengers to contact the FCC with this link to complain.
Emirates is calling the US 5G situation “utterly irresponsible” while the Wall Street Journal (archive link) notes that the FCC was fully transparent about 5G plans since March 2020, which was plenty of time for the FAA to act. The FAA sat on the information until December 2021, having done nothing to resolve the issue. It’s a new low in government incompetence and cross agency turf wars.
Perhaps complaints ought to be directed to the FAA instead of the FCC? Though I wouldn’t expect United to pick a fight with their own regulator. Plus, US airlines are likely seeking that the FCC should be the ones to pay for upgrades to make their altimeters compatible with C-band 5G.
Originally posted on 1/18:
AT&T and Verizon plan to enable C-band 5G in the US tomorrow. Unfortunately despite years of knowing this day was coming, the FAA hasn’t finished studying the impact of 5G C-band on navigation systems and they have been fighting with the FCC to delay the 5G launch.
Earlier this month, AT&T and Verizon agreed to create buffer zones around 50 US airports to reduce the risk of interference and agreed to pause the launch until the 19th, but apparently that was not enough. Similar C-band 5G has launched in France without causing interference issues.
However the FAA says that the US 5G deployment may be different and needs to be further studied.
And now Boeing has warned airlines that C-band 5G service could affect 777 altimeters and that they don’t recommend flying 777s to airports near 5G towers.
In response Emirates, ANA, Air India, JAL, and likely more airlines are suspending 777 service to the US until further notice.
For Emirates, that means that flights to/from Boston (BOS), Chicago (ORD), Dallas Fort Worth (DFW), Houston (IAH), Miami (MIA), Newark (EWR), Orlando (MCO), San Francisco (SFO) and Seattle (SEA) are all suspended indefinitely. They fly the A380 to JFK, Los Angeles, and Washington DC, which will continue to operate.
United says that its 737s and 787s may also be affected by 5G issues.
The aviation industry just can’t seem to catch a break.
Expect to see many more flight cancellations in the coming days…
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44 Comments On "[British Airways, Lufthansa, And Korean Cancel US Flights, United Delays Say Go Complain To The FCC] Emirates, ANA, JAL, And More Airlines Suspend Boeing 777 Flights To The US Over 5G Deployment"
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You are not aware of Verizon and ATT today saying they’re delaying their 5G rollout?
No, they said they’ll delay around some airports. But airlines are still going ahead with cancelling flights.
Read online, it will not go in to effect next to NY airports and Newark for the next 6 months. Is this accurate?
O.k. Dan, can you explain why Tmobile use of 5G for a while now is NOT an issue?
PLEASE EXPLAIN IN LAYMAN’S TERMS!:)
TIA
They use a different frequency band that doesn’t interfere with navigation systems.
> PLEASE EXPLAIN IN LAYMAN’S TERMS!:)
AM/FM
🙂
None of the carriers’ spectrum overlaps the frequencies used in avionics. They’re adjacent frequencies with a buffer, and this is a whole lot of noise about nothing. A non-issue that turned into a hubris-driven p*sing contest between the FAA and the FCC
There are like 4 things masquerading as 5G right now.
Likewise in your house there are a bunch of “wireless” devices. Just because they’re wireless doesn’t mean they’re all doing the same thing. Your TV remote isn’t working the same way your garage door opener is, your bluetooth products aren’t working the same way your wifi router is with your computer/phone.
But they’re all marketed as “wireless devices”
Only your microwave needs special coating on the door to stop you from getting cancer. That one’s dangerous. The rest are fine. The microwave impacts you directly.
Tmobile is your tv remote. ATT/VZW are reheating your pizza.
5th generation cell phone technology (5g) can use a wide variety of radio frequencies. From low bands like t-mobile’s 600mhz bands which travel very far distances, but can carry less data to other middle and high frequencies that can carry much more (eg. faster) data. These higher frequency radio bands can interfere with other electronic devices, such as plane altimeters. That’s the issue here.
Any chance 767 flights get cancelled, too?
Anything is possible at this point, it’s all up in the air.
Pun intended?
Nice pun there…
The next f up in the Biden admin… this was coming for years yet damage control and spin is all they’ll do
This is not one administration fault. If the admin knew it for years, then it is also
Previous admin fault
True, but who has egg in the face ? It’s his problem now
It’s about a year in. If you can still blame the previous admin at this point, it might as well be Obama’s fault
It’s Obama’s fault too. But really really it’s the fault of the pissing match between the FAA and the FCC. Mostly Punchy McPunchface at the FCC and whatever idiot they have at the FAA.
True but Biden had it coming smacking him in the face and didn’t do anything… He’s not a leader…
Is the 777 vaccinated?
Luckily for them, bailouts>breaks
didn’t all 777 received their booster shot last month in accordance with CDC Guidelines?
Short BA stock??? Thank god I’m flying DL A330 to Israel
Are Davke the foreign airlines concerned, or are local United States airines also concerned?
UA flight form EWR to GRU on Boeing 777-300ER – any chance will have any issues?
Still up in the air.
I see that AA has delayed tonight’s TLV-JFK flight by 16 hours so far. No idea if that’s related to this, but they are the only airline currently flying the 777 between the US and Israel.
Likely other 787s get canceled?
BA changed and cancelled some flghts
BA 175 and 269 were plane swapps
Have a 737-800 United flight tomorrow morning out of Newark. Something to worry about? Have a hotel I can still cancel tonight, but would rather not.
I have united credit locked to passengers/destination ewr-bru.
Do you recommend I buy a flight for any time soon which can get canceled so I can get a full refund…
(I believe they fly the 787 (not sure though))
Tia
I feel like this is another y2k type of thing the world is gonna end now
Meh. I bet it’s an excuse so that they can cancel flights that have few fliers right now and this being now an FAA issue gives them cover without possible repercussions.
Conspiracy theorists are right again.
Why didn’t we listen to them?
Insider trading is definitely happening on this one
They knew this was coming, especially since they’ve been battling this one out for a long time, while they were creating the band plan for that specific spectrum. The FAA had an opportunity to protest, and did. The technology is very good today and proper filters will block and RF bleed that could case interference issues.
I think this is more of a political game now. Biden needs some wins and since the C band was made available during the Trump administration, he can now say that he fixed something that Trump broke. They can easily change the channels if they do see a problem. We’re talking 10mhz channels and no need for more for the altimeters, aside from the fact that there are guard bands that they’re using, which was agreed to.
Honestly, not sure if this is just a bunch of idiots or the lawyers trying to make an extra buck on another argument. Perhaps it really is a Biden political game. You’ll see – this will be easily resolved.
On a side note – this is not the 5g that most of us are going to be using in our phones – this is more of a carrier core network product. Live or not, it’s most likely not going to affect your actual speed of download on your phone, unless the network becomes so congested in the area that they need this frequency for backhaul. Either way – it’s pretty much transparent to the average user.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8J2j2PJi1o
Dan,
This video explains the issue in plain English.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8J2j2PJi1o
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/british-airways-air-india-civil-aviation-authority-boeing-japan-airlines-b977575.html
Let’s go Brandon… The hits keep coming
“the Wall Street Journal (archive link) notes that the FCC was fully transparent about 5G plans since March 2020, which was plenty of time for the FAA to act.”
To be fair From March 2020 until today – this may not have been the top concern of the FAA.
the issue with posting complaints on regulations.gov is that you are always able to be pulled up on a google search that you were the one that complained about some issue you had with an airline, I dont need people associating my name that I am a complainer
So use an alias…
They already know everything about you.
What’s pshat that the airlines are only cancelling flights now, a day before the rollout? It’s nothing new that 5G has been on the way for quite some time now…
I’m wondering, maybe the the airlines are anyways canceling flights cause of staff shortages or other reasons and now they have the perfect excuse