I was watching saltydog last summer when that happened, too, so I understand the trouble it caused. It was caused by a back-end software upgrade that failed. The computer techs tried the upgrade, and it failed. But they never informed their customer support side of the company. Some techi-geek was clueless about the number of people who were depending on the service. There is no way customer service / helpdesk people can do anything if they don't even know there is a problem.

Here's the link to last summer's issue:   Spot Satellite Messenger problems

Note that John Sims' InReach was working fine during that time.