Never heard of this before!
Not until I got burnt £18 per day. It happens when you are on a ship and away from land GSM.
Apparently it uses satellites to deliver 4G, which I always thought was impossible due to normal mobile phones having too little power, but obviously that can be solved with a better S/N at the satellite.
Relevant to GA even if only over water.
No idea if it does SMS.
I think in those cases the ship has a 4G tower an it relays the signal to the sats. So you connect to the ships tower and get charged a fortune for the connection.
£18 per day is cheap from what I remember (never got stung myself but was warned).
The usual alternative is a ship WiFi which might be £50 for 5GB which seems expensive but is much cheaper than £18 for 100 bytes of telemetry to the church of apple or android 
But you are probably right about the implementation. The ship will then get a slice of the £18. OTOH it often does not work which suggests the original one.
Yes, 4G service by satellite is becoming a reality, among others with starlink satellites, there is also another provider AST SpaceMobile. See
https://spectrum.ieee.org/satellite-cellphone-starlink
https://www.wired.com/story/your-phone-may-soon-receive-4g-service-from-space/
https://www.t-mobile.com/news/un-carrier/first-spacex-satellites-launch-for-breakthrough-direct-to-cell-service-with-t-mobile
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230621154227/en/AST-SpaceMobile-Confirms-4G-Capabilities-to-Everyday-Smartphones-Directly-From-Space
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/10/spacex-details-starlink-for-phones-plan-launching-in-2024/
The launch partner in the USA is T-Mobile, I don’t know if Vodafone provides that service to its UK customers.
Tampnet is seen in the middle of the North Sea. Billing via Vodafone.
Unfortunately these services won’t work over land AFAIK.
I had a strange experience last year on a cruise ship in the North Sea. I received a text message saying “Welcome to the United States”, and my provider showed as T-mobile USA!
This “maritime service” has the potential of a €100+ per day hit. If you are over a large body of water, best to disable roaming. Or, a smarter way, set the GSM connection to “metered” (an android feature) and that stops the phone downloading updates and such.
I once blew 4GB on 4G by having a win10 laptop using the phone as a hotspot, and win10 downloaded an OS update Solution, again, is to get the wifi hotspot network as “metered”.
Not many people know this. The ship operator will probably not tell you since they are likely to be on a commission.
From here
dublinpilot wrote:
Apparently on O2 in the UK, you can now get Starlink direct to cell as an add on for very little money.
That would be brilliant… where is the catch?
Apps that matter
Nothing beats the feeling of freedom. That’s why O2 Satellite delivers connectivity for the things you need to explore further – from text messaging and apps like WhatsApp to maps, location sharing and weather.
It’s in the FAQ:
O2 Satellite provides coverage in areas the O2 network previously didn’t reach – meaning you can stay connected with services like text messages and location sharing, and apps that matter like WhatsApp, maps and Messenger.Standard voice calls, including emergency calls, aren’t supported on O2 Satellite. Emergency calls might go through if another mobile network is available nearby, but O2 Satellite shouldn’t be relied on for contacting emergency services.
The apps below are currently supported on O2 Satellite – and more will become available over time:
Android apps
- AccuWeather
- AllTrails
- BBC Weather
- Messenger
- Google Find Hub
- Google Maps
- Google Messages
- Google Personal Safety
- Samsung Weather
- X
- Yahoo Mail
Yahoo!
I see this too:
https://www.vodafone.com/news/newsroom/technology/satellite-connect-europe-launches-direct-to-device-broadband-satellite-connectivity
It seems new and not a commercial product yet?
What are the options then to get data while flying at 180 Kts once or twice a month in Europe without paying 250 a month for the Starlink plan?
