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Comments Filed by IARU Member Societies Results in Decision Regarding AST Space Mobile Expansion in the 430–440 MHz Band

On August 29th, 2025, the FCC Space Bureau did grant a license to AST & Sci­ence LLC (oper­at­ing as AST Space Mobile) for using the 430 — 440 MHz ama­teur radio allo­ca­tion for TT&C oper­a­tions for 20 addi­tion­al satel­lites. The FCC Space Bureau com­ment­ed: “At this time, to address the con­cerns raised by ama­teur radio oper­a­tors and the peti­tion­er, we issue a lim­it­ed grant to AST to con­duct emer­gency oper­a­tions in the 430–440 MHz band­when no oth­er bands are avail­able for the 20 addi­tion­al satel­lites autho­rized here­in for a peri­od not to exceed 24 hours.” This deci­sion is the result of over 2500 com­ments to the FCC by ARRL and sev­er­al IARU mem­ber soci­eties, AMSAT, and indi­vid­ual ama­teur radio oper­a­tors. The IARU main­tains its view that the use of Arti­cle 4.4 of the ITU Radio Reg­u­la­tions is inap­pro­pri­ate in this mat­ter, in par­tic­u­lar as there are exist­ing allo­ca­tions in the UHF spec­trum for Teleme­try, Track­ing and Com­mand (TT&C) oper­a­tions. There are no tech­ni­cal or oper­a­tional require­ments for AST & Sci­ence LLC to intrude the 430–440 MHz spec­trum which is a pri­ma­ry ama­teur and ama­teur satel­lite ser­vice allo­ca­tion in ITU Region 1 and in sev­er­al coun­tries in Region 2. The IARU and its mem­ber soci­eties will con­tin­ue to mon­i­tor the fur­ther devel­op­ment of this issue. As a sec­tor mem­ber of ITU‑R, the IARU will con­tribute towards improv­ing the respec­tive process con­cern­ing Arti­cle 4.4.

The IARU is grate­ful for the sup­port and con­tri­bu­tions from our member-societies.

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