FAA: Airlines must retrofit faulty altimeters “as soon as possible”
The Federal Aviation Administration says it finally has a plan for the industry to replace or retrofit airplane altimeters that can't filter out transmissions from outside their allotted frequencies. The altimeter problem has prevented AT&T and Verizon from fully deploying 5G on the C-Band spectrum licenses the wireless carriers purchased for a combined $69 billion.
The FAA was urging airlines to retrofit or replace altimeters in recent months and now says it has finalized a plan. An FAA statement on Friday said that "airlines and other operators of aircraft equipped with the affected radio altimeters must install filters or other enhancements as soon as possible."
AT&T and Verizon said they will be able to accelerate 5G deployments near airports in the coming months, but the carriers agreed to continue some level of "voluntary mitigations" in the airport areas until July 2023.
Altimeters are used by airplanes to measure altitude. The FAA said a new "phased approach requires operators of regional aircraft with radio altimeters most susceptible to interference to retrofit them with radio frequency filters by the end of 2022. This work has already begun and will continue on an expedited basis."
