§ 80.475 - Scope of service of the Automated Maritime Telecommunications System (AMTS).

§ 80.475 Scope of service of the Automated Maritime Telecommunications System (AMTS).

(a) A separate Form 601 is not required for each coast station in a system. However, except as provided in § 80.385(b) and paragraph (b) of this section, the applicant must provide the technical characteristics for each proposed coast station, including transmitter type, operating frequencies, emissions, transmitter output power, antenna arrangement, and location.

(1) Applicants proposing to locate a coast station transmitter within 169 kilometers (105 miles) of a channel 13 TV station or within 129 kilometers (80 miles) of a channel 10 TV station or with an antenna height greater than 61 meters (200 feet), must submit an engineering study clearly showing the means of avoiding interference with television reception within the grade B contour, see § 80.215(h) of this chapter, unless the proposed station's predicted interference contour is fully encompassed by the composite interference contour of the applicant's existing system, or the proposed station's predicted interference contour extends the system's composite interference contour over water only (disregarding uninhabited islands).

(2) Additionally, applicants required to submit the above specified must give written notice of the filing of such applications(s) to the television stations which may be affected. A list of the notified television stations must be submitted with the subject applications.

(b) Coast stations for which the above specified need not be submitted because the proposed station's predicted interference contour is fully encompassed by the composite interference contour of the applicant's existing system or the proposed station's predicted interference contour extends the system's composite interference contour over water only (disregarding uninhabited islands) must, at least 15 days before the station is put into operation, give written notice to the television stations which may be affected of the proposed station's technical characteristics, the date it will be put into operation, and the licensee's representative (name and phone number) to contact in the event a television station experiences interference. No prior FCC authorization is required to construct and operate such a station, but, at the time the station is added, the AMTS licensee must make a record of the technical and administrative information concerning the station and, upon request, supply such information to the FCC. In addition, when the station is added, the AMTS licensee must send notification of the station's location to the American Radio Relay League, Inc., 225 Main Street, Newington, CT 06111-1494, and Interactive Systems, Inc., Suite 1103, 1601 North Kent Street, Arlington, VA 22209.

(c) An AMTS system may provide private mobile radio service in addition to or instead of public correspondence service. However, such communications may be provided only to stations whose licensees make cooperative arrangements with the AMTS coast station licensees. In emergency and distress situations, services must be provided to ship stations without prior arrangements.

(d) AMTS systems providing private mobile radio service instead of, or in addition to, public correspondence service are not required to be interconnected to the public switched network when providing such private mobile radio service. AMTS systems providing public correspondence service must be interconnected to the public switched network, but the licensee may also offer non-interconnected services.

[51 FR 31213, Sept. 2, 1986, as amended at 52 FR 35245, Sept. 18, 1987; 56 FR 3783, Jan. 31, 1991; 65 FR 77826, Dec. 13, 2000; 67 FR 48567, July 25, 2002; 69 FR 19948, Apr. 15, 2004; 72 FR 31194, June 6, 2007]