If you decide to travel anywhere, and I mean anywhere, where telephone coverage is spotty or nonexistent, then you need to look into iridium satellite phones. Iridium satellite telephones came into being in 1998 when Iridium Satellite LLC first launched. It went bankrupt shortly thereafter, but re-launched in 2001 with the aim of providing phone users with complete global coverage. The company claims that their phone system covers oceans, airways, and even Polar Regions. What are iridium phones, and how do they work? Iridium phones use a series of 66 low-earth orbiting, cross-linked satellites to relay telephone calls from anywhere in the world as long as you have a direct line of sight from the handset to the sky. Occasionally, the use of satellites can cause spotty reliability since the signal can get weaker or even lost with each satellite the signal passes through. That aside, the capability for these satellite phones to reach remote areas makes them perfect for the U.S. Department of Defense and outdoor adventurers. Iridium phones are also used extensively by industries like maritime, aviation, emergency or humanitarian services, and mining or oil services. Generally, calls from iridium phones to landlines costs about $1.50 a minute. The reverse, landlines to iridium phones costs $2 to $4 a minute, and iridium phone to iridium phone costs less than $1 a minute. The nicest part about iridium phones though, is that anyone can use them. Even if you just want to take your own little adventure into the woods and want the security of a satellite phone at hand, go to Iridium.com for more information, and let the adventure begin! |
Iridium Satellite Phones
