yeah as someone that isn't following this super closely it feels like the airlines are on their back foot and unprepared. These radios are days away from being turned on permanently and they haven't done any smoke testing? Why weren't they working with the telecoms 12 months ago to run trials?
This is not the airlines problem: the airlines have type certified transport/commuter category aircraft with all kinds of radios - include the radar altimeters that are the problem here - that are required to meet exact performance specifications - which they did.
The FAA waited until December to issue airworthiness directives that limit the ability of the airlines to rely on radar altimeters under certain circumstances. The background here appears to be some kind of pissing match between US government agencies including the FAA, the FCC and the NTIA.
What exactly do you think the airlines were supposed to do here? Go out and have all their radar altimeters replaced? Replaced with what? The required standards haven't changed, and it's the FAA that writes the standard (technical service orders).
This is also not a "smoke testing" problem. This is a "on the worst day, in the worst set of circumstances, what is the degree of compromise of the assumed safety margins" question.
>it feels like the airlines are on their back foot and unprepared.
maybe the airlines should temporarily reassign the teams that redesign seating arrangements to reduce spacing to allow more people onboard. they seem very efficient at their tasks, and there's really not much left for them to do
I'm not sympathetic to the airlines right now.