Hams in the US are getting expanded, non-channelized use of parts of the 60m band under a recent decision by the Federal Communications Commission. The new access applies to General and Extra Class license-holders who, until now, were granted use on a secondary basis of four discrete channels: 5332, 5348, 5373, and 5405 kHz. In a decision released on December 9th, the FCC reaffirmed the continued amateur use of these existing four channels at 100 watts of power, saying there have been no interference issues with federal operations.

The FCC said, that in-line with the international WRC15 allocation, contiguous use between 5351.5 and 5366.5 kHz with a limited emission bandwidth of 2.8 kHz and power of no more than 15 watts EIRP is being granted.

To see the FCC decision and other announcements, see the link in the text version of this week's newscast at arnewsline.org