Satellite Phone Coverage

Old topic but I will throw in my two bits worth. I have had a global star sat phone for 8 years. I live on the North Coast, Interior, area of BC. from about 2006 or so until last year GS service was horible. They had tech problems with a bunch of sats that they could not fix. Over the last two years they have put up a whole new constelation of new technology sats. The last of these was in Feb of this year. The last few sats will be going on line this summer. Starting last summer the sat availability has gone from several minutes an hour, to most of an hour. The bigger your sky, or lower your horizon, the better it works. Narrow valleys or canyons, you have to have a sat overhead. They work on line of sight. Where I use mine I had to use the sat schedual program or could never make a call. Now I just turn it on, if there is no sat, it will be there in a minute. Almost never drop a call. Cost is reasonable at $40 a month with 40 minutes free air. Right now they have a promo so 80 minutes free airtime. Where I live and play cell service is only about 10 km out of town. I carry the sat phone all the time for emergency use. It has more than paid for itself on a couple of ocasions.