The sad death aside, it's interesting to think about how much less the likelihood is of this happening today, just eleven years later. At the time of the story, personal EPIRBS were already a thing. They were small enough that we wore them in our survival vests when flying, and I know that they were a thing with serious hikers, but they were still expensive enough and bulky enough that most recreational hikers wouldn't use them.
These days you can get a tiny personal locator for $300, and I just looked, and a McMurdo Fastfind, a PEPIRB similar to what I carried is even less, at $250. If Elon comes through, you won't even need a personal beacon - you could just use your phone.
I'm not sure you can just use your phone. First, that assumes your phone is charged. Beyond that, doesn't StarLink (like most satellite services) require a fairly clear view of the sky? In heavily forested terrain, I doubt she would be able to connect with a satellite. In days of youre, a Jeep club I was involved in was cutting a new Jeep trail at a now-defunct off-road park in Pennsylvania. One of the guys had a personal GPS that he was trying to use to plot waypoints for the trail we were building. It didn't work -- couldn't connect to the GPS satellites because of the trees.
I'm thinking an old-fashioned magnetic compass is still the best/easiest/cheapest solution. And if all you need is a general direction (east/west/north/south) rather than trying to navigate from a specific point to a known set of coordinates on a map, even a cheapie from Amazon will do thatwithout breaking the bank or adding significant weight.
I have a couple of good hand-held compasses I've had since Boy Scouts, but I bought a couple of these for just carrying in a day pack or in the glove box:
https://www.amazon.com/SE-CC45-1-Lensatic-Compass/dp/B000O5HL0I/ref=sr_1_22?crid=21S2LFG62QU8M&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.7BRPeOVY-YZfvoOY4bAP1pH1zHFxJ-NSIY0V5LkWa5oJp6gtzRCJleOgV6Q4-M3RUoUv8LDImnxp9J_iiYqtxwE-uVCBpwBbs8etq-fFqz6sf2NuwmkL1F8UYTM7ix2gzfWbkUeSG3xhsm95MeIV1Kikb3n9G6iAFswEWlxfBMj6xks_QaDsw5XdFVAVjAl3mIEUzAuy_nBqhtvK_K69Dz1ncJQIiit2_SHqGS1CuSqO7XlAbTOwS3aLrJTvF0lLQamSpKjm2nzJWBbqXOfvskc3phpSAALDw0A6LqbOSdE.9Q_eSd1r7ZQu9CHFPJ_XAwndft1tsyQdHVXOqo3OEbE&dib_tag=se&keywords=hand+bearing+compass&qid=1714930976&sprefix=hand+compass%2Caps%2C918&sr=8-22I also have compass apps on my cell phone and tablet. Unfortunately, my phone and my small tablet are lower-end Samsungs that don't include a magnetometer, so the compass function only works on GPS and only when you're moving fast enough for the system to register a direction of travel. A normal walking pace is enough, I don't have to run -- but it won't work if it can't pick up multiple satellites.