The rollout of the proposed new 5G wireless internet service that has been welcome with mixed feelings in the aviation world may afterall be of less worry to flight operations in Nigeria; the Director General of the civil aviation authority has assured.
Telecommunication firms are prepared to roll out a new, faster wireless internet service across the world before the plan hit some obstacle after air-safety regulators, mostly in advanced countries threatened to impose disruptive flight restrictions, because they said the 5G service could potentially pose risks to cockpit equipment in aircraft.
However, the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority NCAA DG, Captain Musa Nuhu said the challenges are not applicable to flight operations in the country because Nigeria does not make use of the auto landing technology.
According to Wikipedia, the auto landing technology in aviation describes a system that fully automates the landing procedures of an aircraft’s flight, with the flight crew supervising the process. Such systems enable airliners to land in weather conditions that would otherwise be dangerous or impossible to operate in.
While he debunked the notion that the entire idea was hung up because of a tussle about risk to cockpit equipment in airplanes, Captain Nuhu affirmed that it is not completely true that the 5G network has been suspended in the United States.
He said ‘’rather it was just in some of the places close to a few of the airports within some radius that 5G was suspended in order to fully understand what is happening.
‘’The concern raised is about interference with aircraft that are being controlled to land. There is a critical component called radio altimeter; the spectrum by which this equipment operates is close to that of the 5G. So, they are afraid of interference from the radio altimeter and giving aircraft erroneous indication and it’s during aircraft approach landing when they are about 2,500ft or so above the ground. Usually, it is for flights that are put to land.’’
