Regarding the SPOT thread that occurred awhile ago here are some remarks from the law enforcement point of view. This was a hike not a paddler but I suspect the problems are the same. Our agency recently had an opportunity to handle a mission that was a direct response to the new SPOT Satellite Messenger. The subject was a 66 yr old male, who was hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. The subject inadvertently hit the help button on the device. This is one of three buttons, all depressed within the device, that you would push for assistance. Here is what we learned The help key sends a message that the subject needs immediate assistance. That message goes to the subscribers member group via e-mail. This does not go to 911 unless the subscriber actually hits the 911 key. The subcriber members then called 911 to start the SAR. The subject realized his error and tried to correct it by sending an I am okay message, which only his wife received. At this point the wife was so upset she completed discounted the okay and was pushing for an immediate search. None of the other family members who received the distress call received the I am okay call. Our Duty Officer spent nearly 2 = hrs on the phone with the company because they declined to give him tracking information, claiming they could not do that with out a password and login information. Now, the deputy was able to figure out the login with the wifes assistance but not the password. The company finally agreed to give the deputy a temporary password, but said that password would only be sent to the subscribers e-mail. Yes, that is correct, that very subscriber is our missing and possibly injured subject. The wife was able to get on line and access her husbands account to get the temporary password. Now, with that information the company gave the coordinates, which turned out to be inaccurate. I am working on determining how far off the coordinates were So apparently the device has three buttons to push in the event of an emergency. 911 which goes to the local police Help with goes to the family network Okay function, which goes to whomever the subscriber has set to receive that message. Summary, We are not impressed. Christopher G. Madden maddencg_at_earthlink.net *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
On Tue, Aug 19, 2008 at 10:36 AM, Christopher G. Madden < maddencg_at_earthlink.net> wrote: > > Summary, > > We are not impressed. > In a similar vein, the Sheriff's Office in the Wenatchee, WA area had a hiker who was injured and activated the 911 button. According to my source the SPOT center could not figure out which SAR agency was the correct one to begin a search until quite a lot of time had elapsed. This may be a significantly larger issue than the SPOT people initially thought. SAR is relatively advanced in some geographic areas but either primitive or non-existent in others. Even in the USA. And even when there is an SAR agency it might be difficult to determine who they are or how to contact them. Many of them in the USA are keyed to 911 calls on the telephone and it can be very difficult to contact the 911 operators if you are not local. In my area, for instance, the 911 operators are a non-governmental agency that contracts to the police and fire services and is listed in the telephone directory as MACC (Multi Agency Communications Center). Some rural police departments don't even have local numbers that are answered by anyone after normal office hours; the recordings say "if you have an emergency dial 911". In the USA the only national SAR is the USCG for mariners. Otherwise it's generally individual police agencies which, themselves, face jurisdictional problems. Many jurisdiction borders follow the crests of mountain ranges, the centers of rivers and the middle of lakes so it can take some time to determine who is responsible for the rescue even before they scramble the individual personnel. SPOT needs to work to develop contacts within the SAR community so their people can quickly determine who to contact. SPOT needs to work to pull all this together so that more countries - especially those dependent upon tourism - will create SAR systems that can work with SPOT and other SAR agencies in a cooperative manner. This is the only real chance SPOT has to become a credible rescue affiliate. If they SPOT can't do this then it's likely the device will become just a blip in the marketplace. Or worse, if someone sues then over an inability to launch a rescue in sufficient time... and wins a significant award. I can imagine a jury receptive to someone who was told that simply pressing the "911" button would save their life and no one responded. Craig Jungers Moses Lake, WA *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
Christopher G. Madden wrote: > Regarding the SPOT thread that occurred awhile ago here are some remarks > from the law enforcement point of view. This was a hike not a paddler > but I suspect the problems are the same. > Our agency recently had an opportunity to handle a mission that was a > direct response to the new SPOT Satellite Messenger. Chris, just for informational purposes, what is the nature of your agency: sheriff's dept, SAR org., etc? Thanks. -- Dave Kruger Astoria, OR *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
> The subject inadvertently hit the help button on the device. ...... > The help key sends a message that the subject needs immediate assistance. > That message goes to the subscribers member group via e-mail. This does > not go to 911 unless the subscriber actually hits the 911 key. The > subcriber members then called 911 to start the SAR. > . ..... > > Our Duty Officer spent nearly 2 = hrs on the phone with the company because > they declined to give him tracking information, Shouldn't your Duty Officer stick to the rules (please forgive me if they are different than I assumed), and tell the wife and any other subscriber members that SAR can not be initiated unless either 911 signal is received, or there is other evidence that SAR is needed, like too long absence period and/or extreme weather conditions? *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
Christopher said: > Our agency recently had an opportunity to handle a mission that was a > direct > response to the new SPOT Satellite Messenger. I think the problems are NOT unique to SPOT. There isn't a weekend that goes by that I don't hear at least one message from the CG that an EPIRB signal has been received and that all mariners are requested to keep an eye out and render any assistance possible and notify the CG if they find the vessel. I don't believe all of these people really needed a SAR effort, most are mistakes. I think people need a course in reading and understanding simple instructions. The "HELP" function is not to be used for starting SAR ops, it is rather to be used for letting your PRIVATE network know that you need some sort of assistance. You can change the message that goes out to anything you want. I use mine to notify my wife that I am delayed and NOT TO WORRY. The OK message is just so she can keep track and know where I'm at and that all is ok. If help is required because life threatening conditions, exist, then you push the 911 function and that is when SAR should be notified. BTW, I just came back from backpacking in Sequoia National Forest, and I used the "OK" function of my SPOT several times. In all cases, the results match what I get on the water with it. Very quick lock on and transmittal of the messages. All got through. Steve Holtzman Southern California __________ Information from ESET Smart Security, version of virus signature database 3371 (20080820) __________ The message was checked by ESET Smart Security. http://www.eset.com *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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