RBOC joins BoatUS in Urging Action to Protect GPS and SATCOM operations

Five years after the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) decision, BoatUS, RBOC, and 91 organizations have signed onto a letter asking President Trump & Congress to urge the FCC to reverse the order and protect GPS and SATCOM operations.

More from the April 24 statement of the Satellite Safety Alliance that is leading the efforts to protect critical satellite communications services whose operations are under threat from harmful interference by a misguided proposal from Ligado Networks (Ligado) to insert a terrestrial-only service in the middle of a satellite spectrum band:

The Satellite Safety Alliance (SSA) and 93 major companies and organizations, today marked the five-year anniversary of the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) woeful Ligado Order, by sending letters stating the need for it to be overturned to President Trump and Congressional leadership. The letter urges the President and the chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate armed services and commerce committees to work with the FCC on granting petitions for reconsideration that will help prevent the building of Ligado’s harmful terrestrial wireless network. The proposed network is designed to inappropriately use spectrum reserved for satellite communications, causing significant interference to other services.

Ligado’s network would threaten a wide range of critical government and commercial services, including military communications, private satellite communication, GPS, agriculture, aviation, weather forecasting, and more. Satellite Safety Alliance offered the following comment on the letter and fifth anniversary:

For over two decades, Ligado and its predecessors have tried and failed to build a terrestrial network that wouldn’t harm GPS, national security, and other critical interests. The FCC’s Ligado Order has faced unprecedented opposition, including from 14 federal agencies and over 90 organizations representing huge swaths of the economy—from aviation and agriculture to science and manufacturing. Rarely does any issue garner agreement from such a wide and divergent group of constituencies.

Congress spoke clearly and decisively, finding through independent analysis that the Ligado Order poses unacceptable risks of interference to GPS, satellite communications, weather forecasting, and other services. Countless federal staff hours and resources have gone to reviewing, debating, and litigating this issue. It is past time the FCC put the issue to rest by granting the pending petitions for reconsideration.

The SSA trusts the federal government, inclusive of the President, Congress and related agencies will now take the appropriate actions to safeguard the national and public interest by calling for reconsideration of the Ligado Order.

Read the letter to Congressional leadership here and the letter to President Trump here.

BoatUS, Stakeholders Ask FCC to Reconsider Approval of Ligado L-Band Wireless Plan

Wireless network threatens to interfere with nation’s GPS system

SPRINGFIELD, Va., Oct. 28, 2020 – A coalition of groups whose users rely on the Global Positioning System (GPS) wants the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to change its mind about an April 20 decision to permit Ligado Networks to begin construction of a land-based industrial 5G (fifth generation) “L-Band” wireless network. The group is concerned that once operable, the network will negatively impact the reliability of the nation’s Global Positioning System (GPS).

In a letter sent yesterday signed by 78 GPS stakeholder groups including the Keep GPS Working Coalition and Boat Owners Association of The United States (BoatUS) to US Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Chair Robert Wicker (R-MS) and Ranking Member Maria Cantwell (D-WA), legislators were urged to reverse the Ligado Order. It requests the legislator’s “direct involvement to protect the satellite communications and GPS services that we provide and are relied on by tens of millions of Americans every day.” The Commerce Committee's extensive responsibilities include science, technology and communications policy.

Ligado’s slice of licensed “L-Band” spectrum, designated for space-based navigation and communications, is located near lower frequency bands used by hundreds of millions of GPS units in public safety, health, government, transportation, military, commerce, agriculture and more. BoatUS and other coalition members believe that, as the Ligado network is rolled out, instances of signal interference will increase.

“This is about boaters – and many others’ – continued ability to safely navigate and get reliable weather forecasts so we know when to go out or head home, and safety-of-life issues especially when on-the-water help is needed,” said BoatUS Manager of Government Affairs, David Kennedy. “The FCC’s decision threatens GPS reliability for countless consumers, farmers, ranchers, pilots, boat owners, surveyors, construction companies and other private GPS users who will be forced to suffer the network’s interference with their GPS devices or require them to pay to replace them.”

The coalition believes that the Ligado Order disregarded mountains of evidence highlighting the interference issue, ignored established technical standards, relied only on limited studies with vague and impractical criteria to assess interference, and was made during the COVID-19 pandemic while stakeholders were dealing with the health crisis. They claim FCC also ignored serious concerns from the federal government as well as agencies including the departments of Defense, Transportation, Commerce, Interior, Justice and Homeland Security, in addition to NASA, the National Science Foundation, Federal Aviation Administration and U.S. Coast Guard.