NEW DELHI: The list of airlines getting apprehensive about the impact of 5G internet rollout in the US this week on flight operations is growing by the day.
Air India, the only Indian carrier that operated nonstops between Indian the US, tweeted on Tuesday it will “curtail/revise (US ops)... with change in aircraft type from January 19, 2022.”
AI said this is “due to deployment of 5G communications in USA”.
The high speed 5G uses frequencies that are close to the ones that help aircraft measure their altitude.
Airlines are apprehensive that 5G’s possible interference with aircraft instruments can be a serious safety hazard.
Chief executives of several US carriers like American Airlines, Delta and United have jointly written to US aviation authorities, saying: “Immediate intervention is needed to avoid significant operational disruption to air passengers, shippers, supply chain and delivery of needed medical supplies.”
“Airplane manufacturers have informed us that there are huge swathes of the operating fleet that may need to be indefinitely grounded. In addition to the chaos caused domestically, this lack of usable wide-body aircraft could potentially strand tens of thousands of Americans overseas,” the US airlines said.
Air India flies nonstop between several Indian and US cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, New York JFK, Newark (EWR), Chicago, Washington and San Francisco.
United and American Airlines currently fly nonstop between the two countries and Delta is yet to resume those flights.
