The importance of our investments in space have never been so dramatically shown as they were yesterday with the failure of a satellite that re-transmits pager messages, radio and television broadcasts to millions of Americans. As much as 90 percent of the paging network in the United States was affected.
“The average American takes these essential services for granted,” says
Elliot G. Pulham, speaking on behalf of the United States Space Foundation, a founding member of Mission HOME. “But when your wife is in labor, and the
doctor can’t be paged, the importance of a vibrant and reliable commercial
space program is brought home.”
“While the outage of the Galaxy 4 is dramatic, it also illustrates the
unprecedented reliability of the commercial satellite communications system,” Pulham says. “One paging executive was quoted as saying this was the first time the pagers had gone silent in 35 years.”
“As recently stated by General Howell Estes III, commander in chief of the
North American Aerospace Defense Command and the United States Space Command, we must protect our investment in space, and the investment that is going to be made in the years to come,” Pulham says. “In this technological age, we are touched in so many ways by space. Yesterday’s communications disruption shows us all what a very small portion of that investment is worth.”
