I see, the Thuraya had a bit of a hard time because it has only 1 sat covering Europe and it's all the way over Saudi Arabia. So it's not only up a long way but also quite far away geographically. I guess this is why it's so cheap in Europe (2 years airtime - not including calls - was about 40 euro IIRC, whereas with Iridium you would pay more than that every month!)

So it was a bit tricky to reach the sat especially in hilly or built up areas.