Using Satellite Phones From Aircraft - Viable?

[Turk]

I'm not a Comms type, so I would make the (naive?) observation that having a Satphone aboard the aircraft is a nifty way to hit landline comms without running afoul of the FCC regulations.

A couple questions along that line...

1. The use of a Sat phone  (as opposed to a cell phone) aboard GA aircraft is in fact, FCC-legal... right?
2. Would something like an Iridium 9555 require an external antenna, or will its onboard antenna do?
3. In real life, aboard an aircraft, do these things actually work well?
4. There may be some other major point or show-stopping point that I'm missing here. If so, what is it?

[EMT-83]

Some of our aircraft have sat phones built into the comm panel. Service is dependent on satellite location, but they work just fine.

[a2capt]

1: Satellite phones can be used from an aircraft.  Unlike ground based infrastructure.
2: The aircraft kits include a window mount antenna typically.
    The antenna needs line of sight visibility similar to GPS
3: See #2 - it generally means flying in one general direction until the communication is over.
    (in this case, file transfer)
4: .... as in #3.. for best results.


Of course, an externally mounted antenna, or otherwise an antenna that is visible from any angle avoids all this.
Tiger, StingSport, etc ..

[JeffDG]

Both SDIS and GIIEP have SatPhones as part of the system.

There's an Iridium phone in every GIIEP kit out there.