Transportation official: LightSquared 'not compatible' with flight-safety devices

By Brendan Sasso - 02/08/12 04:43 PM ET

Transportation deputy secretary John Porcari told a House subcommittee on Wednesday that LightSquared's planned wireless network is "not compatible" with flight-safety GPS devices used in commercial aircrafts.

He told lawmakers on the House Transportation and Infrastructure's subcommittee on Aviation that LightSquared would disrupt GPS systems that pilots use to help them navigate in low altitudes, including devices that warn them when they are getting too close to terrain.

Porcari said the Federal Aviation Administration has spent $2 million testing LightSquared's network. He called spending that amount of money to review a private company "quite unusual."

"However, due to the Administration’s commitment to increased access to broadband, the investment was merited, but given the results we reviewed, further investment cannot be justified at this time," he said.

LightSquared has invested billions of dollars to launch a nationwide wireless broadband service, but the company ran into problems last year when tests showed its planned network could interfere with GPS devices.

The company says the problem is that GPS receivers are poorly designed and are receiving signals from outside their designated frequency bands.

Porcari said testing confirmed that LightSquared's signal is not bleeding into the GPS band, but he said GPS receivers are too sensitive too filter out LightSquared's powerful cell towers operating on nearby frequencies.

Representatives for the commercial airline industry also testified that LightSquared's network would cause widespread problems for their GPS devices.

"LightSquared was denied a seat at the witness table today," a LightSquared spokesman said.

"Despite repeated requests, we were told there was no need to testify because LightSquared was not the subject of the hearing. We are dismayed but not surprised to hear today that this hearing was little more than a one-sided trial of LightSquared in absentia. It’s outrageous that a congressional hearing set up to examine factual issues was only focused on one side of the story — a side of the story supported by commercial GPS makers who designed faulty devices that depend on using spectrum licensed to LightSquared."

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) granted LightSquared a conditional waiver to move forward last year, but officials now say the company will have to fix the interference problem before receiving final approval to launch its network.

Some Republicans have questioned whether the FCC and the White House have shown inappropriate favoritism to LightSquared. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) has vowed to block President Obama's two FCC nominees unless the agency releases internal records on its review of the company.

LightSquared has until mid-March to secure regulatory approval or it risks losing a multibillion-dollar contract with Sprint.