Federal aviation officials have agreed not to ask for further delays to Verizon and AT&T’s new 5G cellular service, clearing the way for the companies to start their service while avoiding a major clash with regulators who said it could endanger flights. In addition to delaying the start of their service by two weeks, the carriers will temporarily put in place measures designed to address the government’s safety concerns about the technology, particularly around certain airports. The agency had expressed concerns that the new 5G service uses signals that clash with equipment pilots use to land in poor weather. Officials have said they could restrict the use of that equipment, known as radio altimeters, which could force airlines to ground or reroute flights under some conditions. The new 5G service uses a portion of the airwaves, called C-Band, to operate; planes use an adjacent set of radio waves for their radio altimeters. The aviation industry has said the two signals could clash, with potentially dangerous results. In a letter to the wireless companies on Monday night, federal officials said that absent “unforeseen” safety issues with the technology, they “will not seek or demand any further delays” in turning on the new technology. “We are confident that your voluntary steps will support the safe coexistence of 5G C-Band deployment and aviation activities, helping to retain America’s economic strength and leadership role around the world,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and the administrator of the FAA, Stephen Dickson, in a letter to the chief executives of the two companies. The agreement forestalls a collision this week between AT&T and Verizon, which initially planned to debut the service on Wednesday, and the federal regulators who said they could restrict flights if their concerns were not met. The nation’s airlines had said that the restrictions could disrupt hundreds of thousands of passenger flights, not long after holiday travel was dogged by delays and cancellations driven by staff shortages and weather. Last night’s agreement is a significant step in the right direction, and we’re grateful to all parties for their cooperation and good faith,” President Biden said Tuesday. “This agreement ensures that there will be no disruptions to air operations over the next two weeks and puts us on track to substantially reduce disruptions to air operations when AT&T and Verizon launch 5G on January 19th.”<br/>
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Airlines canceled hundreds of additional US flights Tuesday in the wake of winter storms and as the fast-spreading Covid omicron variant hamstrings crews. As of 2 p.m. in New York, more than 1,400 flights around the country were canceled, according to airline data provider FlightAware. More than 2,300 were delayed. Since Christmas Eve, airlines have scrubbed more than 20,000 flights, disrupting holiday plans for tens of thousands of customers during what were expected to be the busiest travel days since the start of the pandemic. Monday’s cancellations totaled 3,225 as a winter storm hit the mid-Atlantic after causing a weekend of disruptions in the Midwest. It was the largest daily total since Feb. 15 of last year, when 3,899 flights were canceled, according to FlightAware. On Tuesday, Southwest Airlines canceled 395 out of its more than 3,600 scheduled flights. The Dallas-based airline faced bad weather that forced it to scale back operations at major airports, including Denver, Chicago and Baltimore. An airline spokeswoman said the carrier was working to get planes and flight crews back in place to resume some of its flights. More than a fifth of the departures at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport and at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport were grounded as of midday. The winter storm also snarled rail travel and roads throughout the eastern US. Drivers were trapped in an hourslong traffic jam after officials closed an icy stretch of I-95 in Virginia. JetBlue Airways canceled 105 flights, or 10% of its Tuesday schedule. A spokesman said the majority of those cancellations were due to schedule cuts it announced last week to help ease staffing constraints as omicron infections sideline flight crews. The New York-based airline will trim close to 1,300 flights through mid-January. Airline investors have shrugged off the disruptions, though. Analysts have forecast a further rebound in travel demand this year, particularly in trans-Atlantic trips that many customers skipped during the pandemic because of a host of travel restrictions aimed at curbing the spread of the virus.<br/>
A US judge has pushed back the trial of indicted former Boeing 737 Max technical pilot Mark Forkner by one month, to a 7 March start, giving Forkner’s legal team more time to prepare. Forkner’s attorneys have also asked judge Reed O’Connor of US District Court for the Northern District of Texas to dismiss the case, citing various legal arguments. Judge O’Connor has yet to rule on that request. But he did, on 4 January, approve the one-month trial delay. O’Connor cited the need for an “abundance of caution” to ensure Forkner’s lawyers are prepared. The US Department of Justice on 14 October 2021 indicted Forkner on fraud charges. Government lawyers allege Forkner deceived the FAA’s aircraft evaluation group (AEG) about Boeing having expanded the capability of the 737 Max’s Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS). The DOJ alleges Forkner experienced the expanded capability in a simulator session. Investigators say MCAS played a central role in two crashes that killed 346 people. Forkner’s lawyers had, on 22 December 2021, again asked the judge to delay the trial, this time for 60 days.<br/>
Europe’s safety authority is initiating research efforts aimed at developing new methods to detect multiple air-data probe failures, as well detect errors in the flight-control laws of fly-by-wire systems. While checks and comparisons on air-data probes are part of modern aircraft logic – and can result in data rejection – the European Union Aviation Safety Agency says that recent safety incidents have highlighted the risks of simultaneous adverse effects on air-data sources. Common-mode influences could consistently affect two or more air-data sources, says EASA, but remain undetected by system cross-checks. This could result in incorrect information – on airspeed, angle-of-attack, or other crucial parameters – being fed to flight-control systems. While significant efforts have been made to characterise icing and raise qualification standards, the systems remain vulnerable to such events as maintenance errors, bird strikes, and volcanic ash emission. “The project aims to further develop the understanding of such failure mechanisms, and to develop solutions,” says EASA, adding that it will improve the authority’s certification standards and support evaluation of new aircraft design.<br/>
Hong Kong is rushing to plug holes that have seen the highly infectious omicron Covid-19 variant finally break through the city’s defenses, banning five more individual airline routes -- including those from Seoul, Vancouver and Delhi -- after discovering infected passengers. Embattled flag carrier Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd., as well as Air India, Air Canada, THAI and Philippines AirAsia have had routes suspended from Jan. 4 to Jan. 17, the government said. That’s the most flights Hong Kong has banned in a day since omicron emerged in November. In total, authorities have banned 24 routes in less than six weeks, throwing holiday travel into chaos. Cathay is bearing the brunt of Hong Kong’s strict Covid countermeasures as it is based in the Asian financial hub, which is pursuing a Covid Zero strategy that is increasingly strained as omicron spreads around the globe, accounting for the majority of new infections. The airline has had seven routes suspended since Christmas Day, including London, Los Angeles and San Francisco. <br/>