Satellite Companies Offer Communication Services to Gulf Coast
WASHINGTON?As bad as it has been, the misery and chaos caused by Hurricane Katrina would have been a lot worse had satellite companies not stepped in to help fill the void created by the destruction of terrestrial communications infrastructure in the affected areas. With cell phone towers and land lines wiped out in the hardest hit regions, relief workers have depended heavily on satellite communications to plan and coordinate their efforts. Satellite-based providers of mobile telephony, data, radio, TV and other services have donated millions of dollars worth of equipment, bandwidth and other resources to the effort. The storm and…
Iridium is Still Going
Someone in a comment to this post mentioned that the Iridium satellite phone network was still a going concern. That was news to me. I used to keep up with those guys back in my 56k.com days, but lost track of them after they went bankrupt. Current phone prices are $1,000 plus and airtime is $1 per minute plus. Hurricane Katrina has Iridium in the news again. To paraphrase John Dvorak, there are probably international backpackers who thought that Iridium…