As 5G communication services are deployed across the USA, a number of international airlines have suspended some of their US operations due to potential signal interference.
Emirates posted a travel notice on its site and said that it will be suspending flights to the following US destinations from January 19, 2022 until further notice:
Boston (BOS), Chicago (ORD), Dallas Fort Worth (DFW), Houston (IAH), Miami (MIA), Newark (EWR), Orlando (MCO), San Francisco (SFO) and Seattle (SEA).
The airline’s flights to New York JFK, Los Angeles and Washington DC continue to operate as scheduled.
Air India posted an advisory on its Twitter account that due to the 5G deployment in the US, it is canceling its flights to New York, San Francisco, Chicago, and Newark.
#FlyAI: Due to deployment of the 5G communications in USA,we will not be able to operate the following flights of 19th Jan’22:
— Air India (@airindiain) January 18, 2022
AI101/102 DEL/JFK/DEL
AI173/174 DEL/SFO/DEL
AI127/126 DEL/ORD/DEL
AI191/144 BOM/EWR/BOM
Please standby for further updates.https://t.co/Cue4oHChwx
Meanwhile, Japan Airlines released a statement saying that aircraft manufacturer Boeing had advised the airline that, “5G signals for U.S. mobile phones, which will begin operating in the U.S. on January 19, 2022, may interfere with the radio wave altimeter installed on the Boeing 777.”
“We have decided not to use this aircraft-type on the U.S. mainland routes until safety is confirmed, and we regret to cancel the flight that cannot be changed to Boeing 787.”
ANA (All Nippon Airways) released a similar statement, citing Boeing’s advice regarding the B777 aircraft, and that the airline had to suspend some flights to the US due to this.
On January 17, 2022, all major US airlines, through Airlines for America, wrote a letter addressed to US government officials that the deployment of 5G could cause disruptions, chaos and cancellations at catastrophic levels.
Airline executives urged U.S. officials to prevent 5G from being implemented within 2 miles of affected airports until the FAA figures out a way for affected airplanes to fly safely or risk a “catastrophic disruption” to passenger flights & supply chain. https://t.co/y1gF980Tgb pic.twitter.com/iAbm05y9NS
— TamiCam(@megami_shiawase) January 17, 2022
On January 16, 2022, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has cleared about 45% of US commercial fleet to perform low-visibility landings at airports across the country where 5G technology had been rolled out.
However, the administration had also issued an airworthiness notification that operators of Boeing 787s are required to take additional precautions when landing on wet or snowy runways at airports where 5G C-band service is deployed.
Neither the Boeing 787 or Boeing 777 have been cleared for these operations yet.
The aircraft models approved include some Boeing 737, 747, 757, 767, MD-10/-11 and Airbus A310, A319, A320, A321, A330 and A350 models.