Month: January 2022

Enlarge / American Airline planes sit on the tarmac at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) in Arlington, Virginia, on January 15, 2022. (credit: Stefani Reynolds | Getty Images)

Update, January 18, 3:50 pm EST: Verizon and AT&T have said they will postpone the launch of their advanced 5G services near certain airports in response to airlines' threats to cancel flights. From the Financial Times:

AT&T said it had voluntarily agreed to “temporarily defer turning on” a limited number of 5G-enabled towers around “certain airport runways” as it provides more information to airlines and regulators, but added it was launching its advanced 5G services elsewhere as planned.

Verizon also said it would launch its 5G “ultra wideband” network on Wednesday, but had voluntarily decided to limit it “around airports,” without specifying the number of airports.

Original story: The imminent rollout of high-speed 5G telecoms services threatens to ground flights across the US, America’s largest airlines warned on Monday, as they urged government agencies to intervene to avoid “chaos” for passengers and “incalculable” disruptions to supply chains.

“The harm that will result from deployment on January 19 is substantially worse than we originally anticipated,” warned Airlines for America, an industry lobby group, pointing to the potential for 5G services to interfere with the sensitive equipment that aircraft use to take off and land.

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Microsoft this morning announced plans to purchase gaming mega-publisher Activision Blizzard for a record-setting $68.7 billion. The move, when finalized, would bring franchises like Call of Duty, Overwatch, Diablo, World of Warcraft, Starcraft, and many more under the umbrella of the Xbox maker.

Today's announcement follows on Microsoft's $7.8 billion acquisition of Bethesda, announced just 15 months ago. After some initial confusion about what that meant for Bethesda's multiplatform titles, it has since become clear that most of Bethesda's biggest franchises, such as Elder Scrolls, will not be appearing on competing consoles such as the PlayStation 5.

In an encouraging sign for fans of Activision Blizzard's multiplatform games, Microsoft said in its announcement that "Activision Blizzard games are enjoyed on a variety of platforms and we plan to continue to support those communities moving forward." But Microsoft and Bethesda executives made similar positive noises about multiplatform titles before the deal was closed, only to shift towards Bethesda exclusivity after the deal was finalized.

Enlarge / A Russian 3-stage Proton rocket blasts into the sky in 2000. (credit: NASA)

Russia's main space corporation, Roscosmos, said it is in the process of building four more Proton rockets before it shuts down production of the venerable booster.

In a news release, Roscosmos said the four rockets are on an assembly line at the Khrunichev State Space Research and Design Center's factory in Moscow's Fili district. After their production is complete, these four rockets will be added to its present inventory of 10 flight-ready Proton-M rockets. (The news release was translated for Ars by Rob Mitchell.)

Russia said it plans to launch these remaining 14 Proton rockets over the next four or five years. During this time frame Russia plans to transition payloads, such as military communications satellites, that would have launched on the Proton booster to the new Angara-A5 rocket.