Please excuse my ignorance, but what do the “safety message” alerts from GM4COX mean? Are we supposed to take any action in respect of these? And in particular, what do the items like “S-12, S+12” mean?
Keenly awaiting enlightenment!
73,
Walt (G3NYY)
In reply to G3NYY:
I don’t actually know - but I would have thought Jack can send some CW, picked up by RBN gate which triggers the spot? To let everyone know he’s still alive? He, like me, enjoys kicking around in Knoydart and there’s no; people, phone signals, shops - nada.
I would assume a friend or whatever is looking out for these spots to ensure his safety.
Just a thought.
R
In reply to G3NYY:
And in particular, what do the items like “S-12, S+12” mean?
Keenly awaiting enlightenment!
73,
Walt (G3NYY)
Walt,
Be enlightened.
In particular he is extending the period during which he will be spotted to 24 hours.
I assume that the ETA on any summit he is planning is unknown at the time he added the alert.
I usually add a +s to my days out to allow for ad hoc changes to my plan (if I have such a thing!)
All the info is here
http://www.grizzlyguy.tv/RBNGate.htm#ExtendSpottingWindow
Pete
In reply to G7LAS:
I’m in the dark, too, but one thing is obvious, and that is that these messages are technically an abuse of Spots. It is an interesting idea and has definite possibilities, but if many people start sending safety messages rather than true spots or the occasional “I’m late” messages then Spots will no longer be so effective because the users will have to sort out the genuine Spots from the other messages.
73
Brian G8ADD
In reply to G8ADD:
If Jack is concerned about his safety in remote areas he can easily purchase and subscribe to a personal satellite tracking system or just carry a McMurdo personal emergency beacon. What he is doing is clearly outside the scope of SOTA alerts & spots.
73 Jim G0CQK
In reply to G4ISJ:
I usually add a +s to my days out to allow for ad hoc changes to my
plan (if I have such a thing!)All the info is here
RBNGate by KU6J - Automatic SOTA Spotting
Ah! It’s an RBN-Gate thing. That explains why I didn’t know what it meant. I do not use RBN-Gate.
Thanks to all who replied. I am suitably enlightened, but I still will not use RBN-gate.
73,
Walt (G3NYY)
In reply to G3NYY:
Is it only me that thinks (rules and stuff aside) what he’s doing is actually quite clever??? ;))))
r
In reply to G8ADD:
To buzzwordify what is going, Jack is leveraging the technology of the SOTAwatch spots and RBN automatic spotting to cause a spot to appear for a non-mountain. The activity by Jack to cause this non-spot is prearranged with someone so they know he’s somewhere safe.
At first glance it all seems reasonable. But as Brian says it’s an abuse and is likely to encourage other non-spotting. There’s also the issue of what happens if the safety spot isn’t seen, for example, it’s deleted by the MT as it’s not a spot. Is a possible 999 call going to be made to a mountain rescue group as a result. What if RBN crashes? What if SOTAwatch fails. It pushes unreasonable responsibilties onto things people do for fun (running RBN and SOTAwatch) into a potential safety of life service which they may not want to be involved with.
I’m sure it would be possible to do something that uses RBN to see a trigger message and use that trigger to do some kind of web/email/SMS activity. SOTAwatch is not the correct medium for this. Or you can buy/hire a satellite phone, or buy/hire an EPIRB, or buy a SPOT tracker. There are few places remote enough in the UK where you probably want such an “I’m OK” service, where Jack is in Knoydart is one of them and up near Cape Wrath is probably one of the other places.
The “check in facility” is something I intend to add to my Iridium satellite based spotting system. Currently it can only send spot messages to SOTAwatch. Having invested in the hardware and air-time, it seems silly not to actually utilise it.
Andy
MM0FMF
In reply to MM0FMF:
The activity by Jack to cause this non-spot is
prearranged with someone so they know he’s somewhere safe.
But that can just as easily be done by someone monitoring RBN directly with the correct Callsign filter set up. Cutting out RBNGate would actually make it a lot more reliable!
I’m seriously considering a SPOT tracker myself as it’s a requirement for an event that I’m planning on doing anyway.
Pete
In reply to G4ISJ:
I’m seriously considering a SPOT tracker myself
If you are going North of Edinburgh I suggest you analyse the SPOT coverage maps and latency to send carefully before punting.
Andy
MM0FMF
In reply to G7LAS:
In reply to G3NYY:
Is it only me that thinks (rules and stuff aside) what he’s doing is
actually quite clever??? ;))))
Ingenious, yes, but not necessarily clever for the reasons that Andy describes. It also puts the MT in an invidious position - if we call a halt to it there will probably be people complaining “because its for SAFETY!”
The fact is that those of us that have ventured into the real wild places - in Scotland I would list for instance, Knoydart, Letterewe and the Northern wastes - have always had to be competent, self reliant and experienced. These places don’t take prisoners, except in the mind, once you’ve been there you never forget! These qualities of competence and self reliance become a matter of quiet satisfaction if not pride. Gadgetry seems to reduce the need for competence and self reliance, it can tempt people to venture beyond their capability - been there, done that, survived and it’s a REAL learning curve! The fact that you can get a message out by RBN doesn’t change the fact that in these places help can be a day away - even in Britain in the 21st century! The onus remains on you to be careful and stay safe, a broken limb may make setting up the radio to call for help beyond your ability. Breakleg terrain doesn’t become easier if you’re carrying a rig!
73
Brian G8ADD
In reply to MM0FMF:
If you are going North of Edinburgh I suggest you analyse the SPOT
coverage maps and latency to send carefully before punting.
+1 for this.
I’ve done a fair bit of research in this area (mostly driven around the legal adoption of COSPAS/SARSAT Personal Locator Beacons for use on land in the UK).
I’ve undertaken this research for two reasons, firstly it is something I am interested in and secondly because the use of these systems is increasing and some Mountain Rescue events have already been initiated through PLBs and SPOT trackers.
Firstly I’d agree that this sort of thing isn’t really relevant for SOTA spots.
If you are a solo walker and concerned about this type of thing you need to ask yourself a few questions before selecting a solution.
Do you want a proven (tens of thousands of successful activations), very reliable system for declaring an emergency anywhere on the surface of the globe? But you don’t want “I’m OK” or “I’m here, track me please!” capabilities. The solution for this is a COSPAS/SARSAT PLB, eg the McMurdo FastFind - other PLBs are available. This has been shown to work under trees and on one occasion when someone had fallen down a steep sided hole with a very limited sky view. Coverage for this is set to be further improved with further overlapping receiver satellites being launched from 2015. The 406MHz PLBs usually send precise GPS derived positions, but even if this fails they can be triangulated. The devices also emit a localiser tone on 121.1MHz which ground or air assets can use to close in on your location. You buy the device REGISTER IT WITH THE MCA (for the UK) and just remember to carry it with you. There are no ongoing rental or usage costs. Test it regularly (there is a test function) and replace the battery at the manufacturers recommended intervals, normally every five years or more. Any live use of one of these PLB type devices goes directly to the nearest government “Mission Control Centre”. UK registered devices go to the UKMCC which sits within the Air Rescue Coordination Center (ARCC) at RAF Kinloss. There have been a handful of invocations of PLBs on land in the UK. (this is what I carry)
Do you need this to work anywhere on the globe and you want “I’m OK” and/or “Track me” messaging? If so then you need a satellite return service that is global. The only truly global public satellite comms service is Iridium, which uses a constellation of 60+ satellites in interlocking orbits that mean that you should always be able to communicate with at least one satellite unless you are indoors or in a very steep sided valley or gorge. Units available from companies like DeLorme and YellowBox plus others. Most “plans” for this require payment of an annual “airtime” charge and a charge for messages sent. Emergency messages go to a US Company who will pass the messages onto government agencies, for examples the ARCC in the UK.
Do you only need this to work in defined areas and you want tracking and I’m OK type messages. For this you can look at SPOT messenger. It uses satellites in low latitude orbits for outbound communication, therefore you must be able to “see” the satellites above the horizon. Something that gets tricky at higher latitudes and also if you happen to be on the north side of a mountain (in the Northern Hemisphere). I’ve done some actual personal field testing with SPOT tracking and found it to be less than reliable under even light tree cover and in a steep sided valley. Testing was done in North Wales. Emergency messages go to a US Company who will pass the messages onto government agencies, for examples the ARCC in the UK. There have been a handful of emergency invocations with SPOT in the UK.
Personally, if I wanted tracking, I’d go for one of the Iridium based systems rather than SPOT. “You pay’s your money, you make’s your choice”
As I say, I don’t want tracking, so I just carry a COSPAS/SARSAT PLB.
73
Gerald
MW0WML
In reply to MW0WML:
SPOT uses GlobalStar where the sats are not Geostationary but LEOs.
Iridium use costs a lot more than SPOT but it works everywhere 24/7. My experience is I can get a message from me to the spotting server in under 30secs. That includes up to a satellite, across multiple sats to the earth station, from the earth station in Arizona to my service provider (UK) via the internet, from my provider to my server software (W7) via the internet, back to SOTAwatch (UK) and on the web page.
There are a whole host of Iridium consumer devices being launched. e.g. a Wifi broadband adapter that functions like the MiFi adapters you can buy from most cellular companies. But uses the satellite network rather than cellular for the backhaul. Don’t ask how much it costs to buy or use because if cost is an issue then it’s not for you! My Iridium unit costs £8/month plus 14.4p per 50bytes (fifty) sent or received.
Andy
MM0FMF
In reply to MM0FMF:
I’ll correct my post. You are right Globalstar is not geostationary, but the sats operate in orbits that only cover fairly low latitudes, which is why they don’t provide high latitude coverage.
73
Gerald
MW0WML
In reply to MW0WML:
Yes, orbit inclination is low hence the poorer coverage up here and hardly any coverage a lot further North for Globalstar.
I talked to a guy who works for the British Anatarctic Survey on the supply ship. He’s a regular visitor to Antarctica and said that Iridium should be brilliant as Inmarsat (geostationary) is a bit marginal at times when the ship is docked there even with a 2m dish. However, he suggests that the potential users of Iridium are so few down there that they throttle back the number of active sats and links to save battery power for when the sats are in eclipse. Getting a line on a sat phone can be difficult if there are already a few calls active.
What was cool is that BAS has 2x unmetered 64kbps links to Halley for data and VOIP. You can dial a number in Cambridge at the BAS HQ and then dial an extension number and the PBX connects the phone line to the VOIP unit and a phone rings in Halley Base on the ice shelf in Antartica! There’s a bit of delay especially if you use a mobile phone but it was riddiculously silly to sit in the radio club and talk a guy at the base and nobody worries about the cost. ISTR it was nearly as cold in Edinburgh as Halley!
Technology… don’t you love it.
Andy
MM0FMF