FCC weighs in-flight wireless

The FCC today opened the door ever so slightly to wireless usage on board commercial aircraft, announcing that it would re-auction the 4 MHz slot of 800 MHz spectrum currently allotted for air-ground communications and weigh the possibility of lifting its 13-year ban on cell phone usage inside aircraft.

Verizon Airfone currently holds the license for the 4 MHz slot which it uses for its satellite phone and data service, but a new FCC plan would open up that spectrum to all bidders, resulting in at least two nationwide air-ground licenses over which carriers could deploy a backhaul link for data connectivity. The matter still doesn’t settle the issue of whether in-cabin Wi-Fi usage would be permitted, but it takes the first steps toward establishing a high-bandwidth link back to the terrestrial world.

"Our rules for the 800 MHz commercial air-ground service has been locked in a narrowly defined technological and regulatory box and have kept passengers from using their wireless devices on planes," FCC chairman Michael Powell said in a statement after the commission’s ruling. "Nearly every party in the air-ground proceeding has commented that the existing band plan and our rules have hindered the provision of services that are desired by the public on board aircraft."

The FCC is proposing a complex plan to divide up the tiny chunk of spectrum. In fact, it is proposing three plans and allowing service providers to bid on whichever plan they choose--the plan with the highest gross bids becoming the plan adopted. The fist plan would create two overlapping, cross-polarized 3 MHz licenses; the second, an exclusive 3 MHz license and an exclusives 1 MHz license; the third, the same exclusive 1 MHz and 3 MHz licenses as the second plan, except at opposite ends of the spectrum block. 3 MHz is deemed the minimum amount of spectrum necessary to create a broadband data link, so if either plan two or three were adopted the carrier with the smaller license would have to use the frequency for voice service. Meanwhile, Verizon gets a non-renewable 5-year license so one of the new licenses would not be available to the carrier that won it until 2009.

The FCC also proposed to relax its current ban on in-flight cellular use by allowing the use of low-power pico-cells on board aircraft. While the FCC is asking for public comment on the matter, any decision the commission makes will have little effect. Lifting the FCC ban would not supercede a Federal Aviation Administration ban on all radio devices in flight. The FAA is reviewing its own policy, but isn’t expected to take any action until a study on the issue comes out in 2006.

The FCC and FAA laws, however, only apply to commercial aircraft operating within the U.S. Companies like Connexion have begun offering in-flight wireless services on international flights coming to and from the U.S.