A Spot Messenger account has been purchased and some initial testing has been done to see how the Spot Messenger fairs with the other electronics. Other Balloon launches have been plagued with interference issues between the SPOT messengers and the other Electronics. Initial testing suggests that the Spot Messenger works fine with other electronic components.
The “Extreme” plan has been purchased which allows Messages every 2.5 minutes. This means that when the balloon is descending, at a fairly quick pace, the chance of getting a message through is going to be reasonably large. One calculation had a time of 13minutes to descend from 6500metres to approximately 0, which means up to 5 ‘way-points’.
We will need to do more testing on how forgiving(or unforgiving) the SPOT Messenger is when orientated in a non-horizontal orientation.