portable cell phone in flight

[737ngpilot]

Is there any limitations against using a hand held Sat Phone in flight to contact dispatch or ATC.
If voice com is not acceptable is sending text(SMS) back and forth ok.
Would this be acceptable procedure with ACARS out of service, or where ACARS is out of range

[kijangnim]

Greetings,

Service providers, such as SITA, ARINC, have a SAT capability to transmit/receive ACARS, it is automatic, as they are end to end users
Now I have an IRIDIUM and a THURAYA Sat phone, IRIDIUM is technically useable in flight whereas THURAYA goesnot go through.

[Mad (Flt) Scientist]

I believe there has been a case (Aer Lingus/Dublin rings a faint bell) where a crew who had lost comms used a regular cell phone and SMS to 'talk' to ATC.

[Groundaphobic]

All the aircraft my company operate are equiped with IRIDUM. Due to the nature of our operations, we are frequently calling our technical people.

If the office wants to call us, there is a tone in the headset, but it can be switched privately to either Capt or F/O.

There have also been numerous cases when it has been the only means of getting weater, airport, notam infomation. And having an independant power source also makes it an extra string to your bow in the event of a really bad day at the office. Unlikely I know, but it has happened.

I have to say thet the quality of reception can sometimes be found wanting, and there have been cases when we have hat to try calling a couple of times in order to get through. I'm not sure why; the system is hard wired into the instrument panel, there is an external antenna. Maybe somone else may be able to shed some light on that one.

It is also an endless source of amusment; especialy when ordering a pizza from one of those places who promise to deliver anywhere.......Oh! How the hours just fly by.....

[LH2]

Now I have an IRIDIUM and a THURAYA Sat phone, IRIDIUM is technically useable in flight whereas THURAYA goesnot go through

There is someone on Pprune who has been experimenting with Thurayas in flight, and has published a write-up here: Satellite Communications In The Cockpit

[Bullethead]

COMMUNICATIONS FAILURE: PROCEDURE IN IMC

IF ABLE CONTACT BRISBANE ATC ON
TELEPHONE: [phone]

From one of the YBBN Arrivals pages. How else but by mobile/cell phone?

Regards,
BH.

[737ngpilot]

Thanks for the feed back. Anybody using portable sat phones tied to a EFB or a hammerhead laptop to get satellite weather pictures and their flight plans etc.

[LH2]

Anybody using portable sat phones tied to a EFB or a hammerhead laptop to get satellite weather

Yes, read the link I posted above.

[IO540]

Iridium seems to be the network of choice of most professional / commercial users, rather than the Thuraya system which is much cheaper to use but whose geographical coverage is limited and whose reliability can be pretty poor (IME).

However I don't think any satcomms network has a monopoly on voice quality or indeed reliability - regardless of pricing. A friend of mine has had an Iridium phone installed in his turboprop, wired properly to his intercom/headsets, and has called me from FL250 or whatever, and the quality was so poor one could barely make out anything.

My guess (as an electronics engineer with a lot of comms experience) is that satelline networks work OK if you implement a very robust protocol which does bulletproof error detection/correction. TCP/IP (internet access) does this of course, for data, or perhaps VOIP if you are paying $$$$$ for a high speed link, but no protocol will protect against the link simply breaking somewhere in space, which seems to happen quite a lot. In these cases the local end (the phone or the computer) thinks all is well with the call but nothing is coming through.

I'd be interested to know how ACARS over a satlink is implemented. Does it use a dial-up call, or is it some kind of "always on" GPRS-like service? With dial-up, one would typically be dialling into a private server. With always-on, it is nearly always going to be an internet connection.