Mendel
Senior Member.
5G may turn out to be a health hazard for people in aircraft.
The RTCA (originally "Radio Technical Committee for Aeronautics") has issued a report at https://www.rtca.org/wp-content/upl...t-Report_274-20-PMC-2073_accepted_changes.pdf last year.
The RTCA (originally "Radio Technical Committee for Aeronautics") has issued a report at https://www.rtca.org/wp-content/upl...t-Report_274-20-PMC-2073_accepted_changes.pdf last year.
Article: The task force was formed in April to address this issue. In December, the FCC plans to auction licenses in the 3.7– to 4.2-GHz frequency band.
By evaluating radar altimeter performance in light of the "expected 5G emissions in the 3.7– to 3.98-GHz band," the task force was able to test radar altimeters to determine their tolerance to the expected 5G interference signals, according to the report. Other research included a risk assessment of how much this interference might happen and its impact on aviation safety.
According to the task force, "The results presented in this report reveal a major risk that 5G telecommunications systems in the 3.7– to 3.98-GHz band will cause harmful interference to radar altimeters on all types of civil aircraft—including commercial transport airplanes; business, regional, and general aviation airplanes; and both transport and general aviation helicopters." The problem isn't limited to the 5G band allocation of 3.7– to 3.98-GHz, however, but also "the spurious emissions from such systems within the protected 4.2– to 4.4-GHz radar altimeter band directly."
The report further warned of "the possibility of catastrophic failures leading to multiple fatalities, in the absence of appropriate mitigations."
Article: "The results of the study performed clearly indicate that this risk is widespread and has the potential for broad impacts to aviation operations in the United States, including the possibility of catastrophic failures leading to multiple fatalities, in the absence of appropriate mitigations," the RTCA stated in its report. Research for the report was conducted by the Aerospace Vehicle Systems Institute, a cooperative research organization based out of Texas A&M University.
Radar altimeters are critical during landings, once an aircraft moves below 2,500 feet from the ground. At that point, no other instruments provide an accurate measurement of a plane's distance from the ground.
"It's so important to have an accurate reading, because if it's a bad reading it could lead to the airplane doing something you don't want it to do." explained Terry McVenes, the RTCA president and chief executive. McVenes is a former Boeing safety executive with 30 years' experience in the commercial aviation industry.
"If your airplane thought it was 1,000 feet above the ground but was only 50 feet above the ground, well… you could have a problem," he said.
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The FCC and supporters of expanding 5G argue that the concerns are overblown.
"In the C-Band Order, the Commission concluded that our rules would protect radio altimeters used by aircraft, and we continue to have no reason to believe that 5G operations in the C-Band will cause harmful interference to radio altimeters," Will Wiquist, a spokesman for the FCC, said in a statement. "Among other things, these altimeters operate with more than 200 megahertz of separation from the C-band spectrum to be auctioned, more protection than is afforded in some other countries.
"Moreover, the RTCA report was prepared outside of the joint aviation/wireless industry group that was set up at the Commission's request and is not a consensus position of that group. Indeed, at least one other member of that multi-stakeholder group has expressed significant concerns with the study and several of its assumptions, and the Commission's experts have concerns with this study as well."
