Airline Pilots Association Joe DePete told Yahoo Finance in a video chat that pilots have been concerned about 5G since 2018. Speaking about the recent agreement by AT&T and Verizon to delay their 5G transmissions on C-band for an additional two weeks (see previous story), he said those transmissions don’t just threaten aircraft radio altimeters, but other systems too.
One of those are auto throttles, he explained. “An uncommanded reduction in our throttles on a big, let’s say a triple seven at about 100 feet, at 200 feet, without a quick response, I mean a really quick response, will develop a pretty serious sink rate,” he said, according to a transcript. “And you’d have the pilot [who] would have to arrest that sink rate very quickly,” he notes.
DePete cited potential interference with the ability to tell how far the aircraft is from the earth. “[I]magine flying blind like that or getting incorrect signals to the flight crew. Also, everything from handling the aircraft, the thrust reversers, things like that. In every landing we make, we calculate the landing distance and things like that. So my point is [there are] lots of safety implications here.”
DePete applauded the latest agreement, but said whatever solution is agreed on needs to be approved by pilots.
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