via the ARRL: FCC Approves Limited Emergency Use of 70 cm Band by AST SpaceMobile Satellites Outside the US

On April 21, 2026, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) granted AST SpaceMobile limited authorization when not over the United States to use five 50-kHz channels in the 430–440 MHz secondary amateur band for emergency Telemetry, Tracking, and Control (TT&C) operations for its planned satellite constellation (DA-26-391 Docket No. 25-201). The authorization applies only for communication with five specified earth stations, each located well outside of the United States and for which the foreign administration with jurisdiction also must separately authorize the communications.

More than 2,500 comments were filed during the proceeding including filings from ARRL The National Association for Amateur Radio® and other member societies of the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU), AMSAT, and individual radio amateurs worldwide.

After considering the filed comments, the FCC narrowed the requested authorization to emergency TT&C only and further provided that:

Use of these frequencies is permitted only in emergencies when no other spectrum is available

Each emergency event is limited to no more than 24 hours

Transmissions are restricted to five specific center frequencies (430.5, 432.3, 434.1, 435.9, and 439.5 MHz), each with no more than 50 kHz bandwidth

In an April 29, 2026 statement, the IARU expressed concern with the FCC’s use of Article 4.4 of the ITU Radio Regulations, which allows administrations to authorize non-standard frequency use under certain conditions. The IARU stated that other frequency bands allocated for satellite TT&C should have been used instead of amateur spectrum and encouraged amateurs to report any interference to their national regulators.

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