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To: djane who wrote (5525)	7/5/1999 3:30:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 29987

Cell Phones Invade Wilderness (via g* yahoo thread) July 5, 1999 LAKE PLACID, N.Y. - The Associated Press via NewsEdge Corporation : High above the trees and surrounded by sky, the Adirondack peaks can seem far removed from the everyday world. Unless, of course, the guy next to you is jabbering on his cell phone. Such a surreal scene played out on Mount Marcy's summit in front of state forester Jim Papero. He remembers it well: ''It was cold and windy. Beautiful. You could hear the wind whistling and everything, then this ... he was talking to his stockbroker.'' Cell-phone chatter, already common at restaurants and shopping malls, is heard more and more often in the wilderness. Hikers and campers are tapping into personal directories to ask directions and apologize for dinner delays, to bum rides and call in sick. This is not amusing to many campers, hunters or others who appreciate nature's quiet. The problem has prodded New York environmental officials, who also worry about hikers using cell phones as lifelines, to promote phone etiquette in the wilderness. ''To be walking down a trail or expend the effort it takes to climb one of the high peaks, and to see someone on the telephone ... it's disconcerting,'' says Stu Buchanan, regional director of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. There's no backwoods cell-phone epidemic just yet. But calls from the wild have become noticeable recently, now that wireless phones reach an estimated 74 million users nationwide. What can be a mere irritant in civilization can be a lifesaver in the wild. Rescues have been launched after timely calls for help from remote areas. Even many ''Ridge Runners,'' whose job is to help hikers on the Appalachian Trail, now carry cell phones. Problem is, cell phones aren't reliable in the wild because cell towers tend to be far apart. Then there's the problem of getting a phone to work in gorges, gullies and other pockets amid peaks. It's a Catch-22 because efforts to build cell towers in remote areas are often opposed by locals and conservationists concerned about rural eyesores. Even when phones can hail a signal in the backwoods, rescuers complain about trivial ''emergencies.'' Rangers in New York report picking up the phone to hear hikers asking directions or complaining about sprained wrists. Rick Donovan, owner of an outdoor gear store in the Berkshire hills at Great Barrington, Mass., has received cell-phone queries about how to light the camp stove. Or worse: ''They're calling my store and asking me for a ride. What happened to the days of walking down the mountain?'' Baxter State Park in Maine has banned the use of cell phones on park grounds, as it had earlier excluded radios and cassette players. Park naturalist Jean Hoekwater says the ban in part targets nuisance calls the likes of, ''Honey? Guess what I'm in front of right now. A big moose!'' New York has no bans yet, but the state-sponsored effort to discourage frequent and non-emergency use of cell phones is to begin this summer with brochures, videos and trailhead postings. Can education work? Michele Morris, senior editor of Backpacker magazine, calls it the key. She's hoping for new attitudes of self-reliance and consideration. Stephen Jacobs, an associate professor of information technology at the Rochester Institute of Technology, predicts the problem will ''auto correct'' over time as more people consider it rude to ring. Don't expect cell phones to disappear from the woods any time soon though. A survey by Backpacker magazine last year found cell phones a popular item on readers' ''to buy'' lists. Meanwhile, some high-end cell phones can pull in signals from satellites, eliminating the need for towers. With the right equipment, even the deepest, most remote gulch can be just a phone call away.

To: djane who wrote (5525)	7/6/1999 12:50:00 PM
From: djane	Respond to of 29987

skyreport.com. Future LEO Services Move On Launches Arianespace will provide launch services for the Ellipso satellite system under a large financial package involving vendor financing and an equity investment in the future low-earth-orbit satellite system. Ellipso President and CEO David Castiel said the deal "will give our investors confidence that Ellipso's satellites will be launched on time to the proper orbit. "Arianespace's investment further validates Ellipso's consumer-driven design and demonstrates confidence in the market for mobile satellite services. We look forward to working with Ariane and getting the Ellipso system into service as quickly as possible." Arianespace's Ariane 5 vehicle will place Ellipso's LEO satellites into an elliptical orbit above the equator dubbed Concordia. From the unique Concordia location Ellipso can provide telephone and data services to more than 85 percent of the world's population. Each Ariane 5 launch can carry up to four Ellipso satellites. Flights begin in 2002. Meanwhile, Loral Space and Communications and Globalstar awarded a contract for the launch of four additional LEO satellites to Starsem, the French-Russian joint venture. The contract adds another launch to the six launches previously ordered by Globalstar. The first three have taken place, and three are scheduled for the next few months. One may take place this week. Starsem markets the Soyuz-Ikar launcher, which launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Starsem's shareholders include Aerospatiale Matra, Arianespace, the Russian Space Agency RKA, and the Samara space Center. back to today's headlines