[CTSARA] Amateur Radio Becomes Primary on 1900-2000 kHz on August 6

[Tom Alessi]

Amateur Radio will be upgraded on August 6 from secondary to primary in the
1900-2000 kHz segment of 160 meters in the US. That’s the effective date of
the WRC-07 implementation Report and Order and WRC-12 Order portions of a
lengthy FCC document released on April 27. Both portions
<https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2015/07/07/2015-15249/wrc-07-implementation-report-and-order-and-wrc-12-order>
appeared on July 7 in the Federal Register; the Notice of Proposed Rule
Making (NPRM) of the same proceeding was published in the Federal Register
on July 2. The FCC also made a secondary allocation of 135.7-137.8 kHz to
the Amateur Service, but this band will not be available until service
rules have been adopted.

“The FCC action with respect to 1900-2000 kHz reduces the possibility that
we might suffer in the future from new radiolocation deployments,” said
ARRL CEO David Sumner, K1ZZ. “On the other hand, we will have to put up
with radio buoys that have been operating illegally in the band but that
now have been ‘regularized’ by the Commission.”

The FCC said that while it had believed there was no non-Federal RLS use of
the 1900-2000 kHz band, the record indicated there are maritime users,
including the US “high seas” migratory species fishing fleets, making use
of radio buoys in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans as well as within 200
nautical miles of the coast. It did not identify these users in the WRC-07
proceeding, however, “because they did not appear in its licensing database,”
it said….


Tom Alessi
Tom at K1TA.com  |  www.K1TA.com
C: (203) 253-7745 | O: (914) 231-1691 | F: (914) 813-4091
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