It worked, but the transmissions went through only  sporadically, making the system unreliable for this purpose at least.  In addition, the technology required plenty of tech work to be performed in camp, requiring as much as two hours of precious rest time.

Surprisingly enough, the hard ware held up well. Apart for minor failures, the head mounted display, the wearable computer and the other tech performed their tasks. The team had been specifically worried for the liquid crystal displays, normally prone to freeze.

"As time went by, we would have to do plenty of patchwork between the systems to get our job done. A bit failed here, then another there. In the end, we would pull wires past chargers straight into the solar panels for power, use the finger mouse to edit pics in the HMD, and the touch screen keyboard on the flat panel for text.  But most hardware was faithful to the bitter end. The various computer software proved to be the weak points.  As for power, the solars really provided more than plenty of juice, so much in fact that we burned a battery pack. "

Last year, the sun was in the eleventh annual cycle of extraordinary violent solar flares. These are created by strong solar eruptions, offering beautiful auroras on earth, but also affecting satellite communications.

This year, the sun is back to normal, instead the war on Afghanistan could inflict intentional jamming of military satellite signals, such as the Iridium.