I recently acquired an Iridium Go Exec. It’s a portable (ok, maybe a little big and heavy…) device which gives reliable worldwide voice and data (at 88kbps download / 22kbps upload. and ~$4/MB…). I also own an Iridium 9575 satphone (which I’ll probably sell soon), so that’s what I’ll be comparing with the Go Exec.
My mission is… everything. I recently got back from flying my DA42 around the world, and I live in Puerto Rico where I use my bird to island hop every weekend. Previously, I had the satphone in case of emergencies, and for ATC reports (as over the high seas, you don’t have VHF communication coverage). In short, only for essential operational voice use.
My 9575 satphone was a bit cumbersome to use. The plane is too loud to use the satphone directly against your ear, so I had to patch it into my headset using a mess of wires and a converter box. In addition, I needed to use an antenna on the glareshield. This meant I had to unpack a lot to get the satphone functional, and put it away before landing. In practice, I found myself only using it for when I was required to do so for ATC position reports over the high seas. There were places where I would have used a satphone if convenient (call FBO to have them book hotel / rental car, update customs ETA), but I didn’t because it was a PITA to setup.
That said, the 9575 did what it was advertised to do. It gave me near-100% reliable worldwide voice coverage, which is worth a lot when you’re flying in remote locations with no VHF comms, other than an overhead airliner.
The Iridium Go Exec is not exactly a satphone… it’s more of a portable internet device with an antenna. You use it connected to a smartphone via Wi-Fi/Bluetooth. It’s a bit heavy/bulky, but I can squeeze it on top of my DA42’s economic glaresheild if I’m OK with the antenna touching the canopy.
- I can connect my phone to it, which means I can use bluetooth through my normal phone / A20 headset to make calls in flight. No mess of wires.
- I can use standard iMessage / WhatsApp to text friends, which means they see my normal number instead of +8816
- The call quality is substantially improved. Not the same as a landline, but completely usable, I don’t have to ask anyone to repeat themselves
- I have access to (somewhat) usable data for accessing weather
- It has a built in antenna, so no need to mess with external antenna wires
- (minor) It has a standard USB-C port for charging, and another USB-C port to act as a battery bank
The short is… it does, kind of. I did a sample test in-flight where I downloaded the radar in flight for a small region. I was able to get this picture in probably 2-3 minutes, using ~2MB of data.
Overall I’m happy with the upgrade. While the data is neither blazing fast nor cheap, it does work, and enhances my cockpit experience today. I’m mostly intending to use the device for low-bandwidth texting on iMessage / WhatsApp which it does beautifully. I know there’s probably more exciting tech down the pike with Starlink-type speeds in cockpit, but this is available today and is a huge game changer on almost every flight.
