Red River Radio Amateurs

Continues Amateur Use of Four Additional 60-Meter Channels and Updates 420 MHz Coordination Information

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on December 9, 2025, released a long-awaited Report and Order adopting a new amateur radio spectrum allocation in the 60-meter band that was approved for world-wide use on a secondary basis in the WRC-15 (World Radiocommunication Conference 2015) Final Acts. The Commission also agreed with a petition from ARRL The National Association for Amateur Radio® to continue to allow amateur operations on four existing 60-meter channels outside the international allocation with a full 100 watts. The new rules will go into effect 30 days after publication in the Federal Register, when amateurs may then begin using the allocation.

ARRL The National Association for Amateur Radio® reports that the FCC has extended the filing deadline to March 5, 2026, for amateur radio licenses that otherwise were due to expire from October 1, 2025, to March 5, 2026. The announcement is included in an FCC Public Notice (DA-25-943) released on Monday, November 17, 2025. ¹

As part of a much larger overhaul focused on deleting almost 400 obsolete wireless regulations, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has announced plans to delete or modify four minor provisions of Part 97.

for Commercial Satellite Communications in FCC Filing.

This may well be the most significant challenge to date to one of Amateur Radio’s most popular bands. It’s particularly significant for Amateur Radio space communications, as that usage directly competes with this company’s use case — satellite communications.

In DA 25-532, released 2025-06-20, the FCC Space Bureau has accepted a filing from AST SpaceMobile to conduct Telemetry, Tracking, and Command (TT&C) in both space-to-Earth and Earth-to-space communications modes in 430–440 MHz. In the document, AST SpaceMobile is referenced as AST & Science, LLC (AST).

President Trump’s attack on public broadcasting has attracted plenty of deserved attention, but there’s a far more technical, far more insidious policy change in the offing—one that will take away Americans’ right to unencumbered access to our publicly owned airwaves.