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Emergency SOS via satellite

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Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#411

Post by circular_lights »

kenhwang wrote: post #362
ingalls wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First off, super glad to hear your friends are out of the field safe. Want to address one point however: "The SOS button is very expensive. Extremely expensive" In my experience on multiple SAR teams (Search and Rescue), this is almost never the case in North America. Search and Rescue is one of the few services that is almost uniformly free [1]. Thousands and thousands of volunteer hours every year keep it that way.…

As someone with a bunch of idiotic friends that always find themselves needing SAR in North America. The rule of thumb within the group that has generally held true is: if you're on federal lands it's fully free, but if you're in resort, city, or state jurisdiction they'll absolutely try to claw back the costs. The SAR might be technically "free", but they'll categorize as many things under "medical emergency" as pos…

I love that your friends had enough instances to develop rules of thumb. :D Sounds like a fun bunch.

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#412

Post by circular_lights »

biomcgary wrote: post #299
widforss wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm on a SAR team. We literally deployed 10 people on both PLB's and Inreaches last winter. SAR people are cheap

SAR people may largely be volunteers, but helicopters have fairly expensive operational costs. In time-sensitive situations, it is better to have two way communications (because it keeps SAR as inexpensive as possible). See my sister comment for my wife's experience.

I was wondering who foots the bill for the equipment

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#413

Post by mthoms »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #298
COGlory wrote: post #123

I was just on the ground coordinating with 4 friends that got buried in 5+ foot of unexpected snow in the mountains (forecast said 1"-2" when they went up) for the rifle opener in Montana. I wound up getting sick so I stayed home (hilariously I was the only one who got an elk) but I sent them up with my InReach. All I can say is THANK GOD that I did, because it turned into over a week long effort to get them out. Two…

> there needs to be a "use it now, pay later" or no one is going to activate it and actually have it available when they need it I've been solo hiking, running, kayaking, and biking in areas without cell service since before cell phones were things people carried. Haven't needed emergency search-and-rescue in 20 years, so it's just never seemed like a good investment...that's $3600 I could have 'wasted' on a service…

>Haven't needed emergency search-and-rescue in 20 years, so it's just never seemed like a good investment

It's just $16 a month and there are other uses besides SOS; like texting to say you'll be late but everything is fine or that you've decided to stay another night. You can even get weather forecasts which is pretty huge if you ever do multi-day trips. Besides all that, carrying an InReach could one day save someone else's life.

The most important benefit it gives me (and my wife) is peace of mind. I find it worth every penny.

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#414

Post by mthoms »

walrus01 wrote: post #302
COGlory wrote: post #123

I was just on the ground coordinating with 4 friends that got buried in 5+ foot of unexpected snow in the mountains (forecast said 1"-2" when they went up) for the rifle opener in Montana. I wound up getting sick so I stayed home (hilariously I was the only one who got an elk) but I sent them up with my InReach. All I can say is THANK GOD that I did, because it turned into over a week long effort to get them out. Two…

If you're seriously going to go into the back country in the rural western US states and Canada, and you have a good paying professional job, there is no excuse, in my opinion, not to spend $1000 on a full capability Iridium handset and the $50/month service plan that goes with it. If you really NEED to use it you won't care that it costs $1.20 a minute to make a call. https://www.iridium.com/products/iridium-9555/ P…

I agree with your sentiment but I'd add that a full handset is overboard in many cases. An InReach mini (or similar) will work fine for many/most people

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#416

Post by rootusrootus »

modeless wrote: post #402
rootusrootus wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm surprised there isn't much discussion here about the similar capability announced by SpaceX and T-Mobile Because the Starlink satellites in question don't exist yet, and it's Elon Musk making claims about existing handsets working -- he has a spotty record when it comes to making accurate announcements. I enthusiastically look forward to more capability in this space. But I doubt very much that Apple is introdu…

Distrusting a whole technology simply because you happened to hear about it first from Elon Musk is pretty silly IMO. Anyway, there's nothing impossible about it. AST Spacemobile has already demonstrated a satellite to ground link with regular cell phone hardware on one end (the space end, since it's easier to launch a phone than a giant phased array antenna, but they also did just launch a giant phased array and wil…

Where did I say I distrusted anything based merely on Elon Musk saying it? I gave a few reasons why what he claimed should be taken with a huge grain of salt. His own history is a pretty strong recommendation in that regard.

Comparing BlueWalker to Starlink v2 makes no sense, unless you think SpaceX is going to be putting that huge phased array on every v2 satellite they put in the sky? It's a different technology entirely.

Now, maybe Elon was hinting at an impending acquisition? :). That would certainly be on character for him.

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#417

Post by skeyo »

Johnny555 wrote: post #189
Buttons840 wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does InReach require a monthly cost? Alternatively, you can spend about $200 one time on a personal locator beacon that requires no ongoing costs. It can't do two-way communication but activating it sends out a specific frequency picked up by satellites and is the equivalent of calling 911. Rescuers will come to help you. All serious hikers and outdoor adventurers should carry a personal locator beacon.

Does InReach require a monthly cost? Yeah, the cheapest plan is $14.95/mo ($11.95/mo if you pay for 12 months) and includes 10 "free" text's, $0.50/text after that. I wish they had a non-cost plan (or maybe $10/year) plus $5/text or something like that for use in an emergency. I have an InReach, but haven't used it for an emergency (yet), I've sent a few texts to friends/family while outside of cellular coverage sinc…

For me it's the best $15/mo I spend. As someone who is regularly alone in the backcountry far from cell service, it's massively nice to know that I can communicate something wrong or if simply running late. And my wife also has to worry far less knowing that I can let her know if something goes wrong. She also has the ability to request my location without me doing anything in the event I were unconscious or something.

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#418

Post by lxgr »

drozycki wrote: post #403
lxgr wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Band n53" has been widely reported in the context of various iPhone satellite rumors, but I still believe that this was actually just bad reporting: Band n53 is essentially terrestrial LTE/5G usage of Globalstar's global spectrum rights in a band that was previously designated for ground-to-space usage. Whatever the iPhone 14 is using to talk to the Globalstar satellites, I'd be extremely surprised if it looked anyt…

I remember reading that they are in fact using n53 2.4Ghz. Remember this is a fallback for areas without cell service, and a satellite signal is much weaker on the ground than any terrestrial signal.

Given that it's a two-way service, and Globalstar satellites use the 2480-2500 MHz range for downlink transmissions, it must be using 2.4 GHz, yes.

But my point is that this probably has very little to do with Globalstar's terrestrial band 53 efforts, other than possibly sharing some HF hardware in the new iPhones given that they support both that terrestrial LTE/5G band and satellite messaging.

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#419

Post by skeyo »

subsubzero wrote: post #376
c0nsumer wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure of that? I can find no info nor claims of inReach devices doing anything voice-wise, even when paired with a phone.

I think I didn't write that clear enough :) I haven't used mine like this so far.. but you can pair the garmin to a phone(via the connect app) and make a call from the phone using the garmin as an antenna so to speak, you cannot talk or hear anything on it(the garmin inReach).

That's definitely not a thing.

Re: Emergency SOS via satellite

#420

Post by modeless »

rootusrootus wrote: post #416
modeless wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Distrusting a whole technology simply because you happened to hear about it first from Elon Musk is pretty silly IMO. Anyway, there's nothing impossible about it. AST Spacemobile has already demonstrated a satellite to ground link with regular cell phone hardware on one end (the space end, since it's easier to launch a phone than a giant phased array antenna, but they also did just launch a giant phased array and wil…

Where did I say I distrusted anything based merely on Elon Musk saying it? I gave a few reasons why what he claimed should be taken with a huge grain of salt. His own history is a pretty strong recommendation in that regard. Comparing BlueWalker to Starlink v2 makes no sense, unless you think SpaceX is going to be putting that huge phased array on every v2 satellite they put in the sky? It's a different technology en…

You clearly know very little about this. Why are you making statements as if you knew a lot? The Starlink satellites supporting this service will indeed have large phased arrays. Not as large as BlueWalker-3, because BlueWalker-3 is targeting general data service while Starlink is targeting a limited, text-message only service with much less bandwidth (though still a lot more than this Apple thing).
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