unmediated: Personal Location Devices

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December 21, 2006

David Pogue in the NY Times has a good review of Cellphones That Track the Kids:

But this is one sci-fi gadget that’s no longer fi, thanks to advanced sci — satellite-based tracking based on GPS technology. At least five companies — Wherify Wireless, Guardian Angel Technology, Disney Mobile, Verizon Wireless and Sprint — have built G.P.S. tracking into something children carry voluntarily: cellphones. The super-simplified Wherifone ($100), for example, is intended for very young or old customers. Because it has no number pad, it’s probably the smallest cellphone you’ve ever seen — about the size of a Fig Newton. On the company’s Web site, wherifywireless.com, you can program three of its four speed-dial buttons to dial Mom, Dad and Gramps, for example; the fourth summons an address book containing 20 more numbers.

For $10 a month, Sprint’s Family Locator feature offers 58 trackable phone models for your children; Verizon’s Chaperone plan offers four phones, including the Wherifone-like four-button Migo for younger children. You, the parent, can perform unlimited location checks either from a Web site or your own Sprint or Verizon phone (30 models from Sprint, 12 from Verizon).

Sprint’s map Web page is far more sophisticated than Verizon’s — it offers aerial views, reports of past locations and the ability to add landmarks to the map (like “Robin’s house”), but it’s incompatible with Safari, the Macintosh browser.

Verizon offers, for yet another $10 monthly, another equation-changing feature called Child Zone, in which a text message notifies you every time your child strays beyond geographical boundaries that you’ve set up. It’s like a more humane version of the electric doggie fence.

High-tech locating devices might have aided NW Search and Rescue organizations in their hunt for three missing climbers on Mt. Hood, reports KGW television (video).

Using these high tech locator devices “is not a common practice” among climbers of Mt. Hood, said Brian Wheeler, founder of the Northwest School of Survival explains what to expect before you leave (pdf).

Wheeler described five devices available to climbers that can decrease the chances of getting lost, and increase the chances of getting found:

Mt. Hood Locator Unit (MLU)

Avalanche Transceiver

Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) devices

Satellite Phone

Personal Locator Beacon (PLB)

According to KGW:

Mt. Hood Locator Units can be rented at most local climbing shops for about $5. They transmit a signal that can be picked up and traced by searchers. In the case of the three climbers on Mt. Hood, Wheeler said an MLU would not have helped during the severe weather because rescuers still could not reach the climbers’ location. “The MLU might have enabled them to locate the snow cave one day sooner,” said Wheeler.

Avalanche transceivers, which retail for between $300-$400, help climbers locate each other – and rescuers locate climbers – in the event of an avalanche. Once turned on, the beacons send and receive a signal on a specific frequency that anyone can track.

“Anyone traveling in potential avalanche terrain should be carrying avalanche beacons,” said Wheeler, who added that the beacons have their own limitations. The signal from a typical beacon only reaches about 40 yards, so searchers would have to be in the immediate area in order to locate the signal.

Most GPS locators do not send out a location signal so that probably would not have helped searchers find the missing climbers, said Wheeler, but a GPS unit might have enabled the climbers to successfully navigate off the unfamiliar summit of Mt. Hood in bad weather.

A satellite phone offers greater potential for making a rescue call for help but such phones don’t transmit GPS coordinates and can cost thousands of dollars to purchase and activate, said Wheeler.

A relatively new device, the Personal Locator Beacon, was approved for sale in the United States by the F.C.C. in 2003. The devices, which cost between $600-$700, are the ultimate high-tech call for help. The device is registered in the owners name and, when activated, sends a signal to a satellite that triggers a rescue response from local law enforcement, said Wheeler.

Experts warn these high-tech location devices are not cure-alls. “Knowledge is really important in using transceivers,” said Nat Crossman of OMC.

In addition, knowing a missing climber’s location doesn’t guarantee a successful rescue. “You still have to be able to survive long enough until someone can get to you,” said Wheeler, who advised those traveling in the backcountry to “always, always take GPS, a compass, and a map – and the knowledge of how to use them.”

On Monday, Japan’s space agency (JAXA), deployed the Experimental Test Satellite spacecraft (ETS-8) in a geosynchronous orbit. The spacecraft, also known as Kiku 8, will test a pair of huge antennas that will provide high-powered communications services, directly to handsets.

An operator wearing a wearable camera in a disaster-stricken area transmits images taken by the video camera on a hardhat and by a stick camera, with location information acquired by the GPS antenna, to a nearby portable terminal via a ground wireless antenna. The portable terminal will then send the images and information to an anti-disaster headquarters for a quick response led by headquarters.

DailyWireless has more on Mountain Rescue, UAVs, E911 & Triangulation, Polar Flight Telemetry, Antennas In Space, John Malone in Space and Cellular Blimp.

Originally posted by samc from dailywireless.org, remediated by yatta on Dec 21, 2006 at 4:20 PM

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December 21, 2006

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