Region 4 S: ELT Mandatory

"Chris OCallaghan" wrote in message
om...
Tim,

I'm disappointed by you lack of knowledge. Your word carries weight as
an expert in these matters. Get expert. For example, 406 ELTs are dual
frequency, broadcasting on 121.5 as well.

Please read what I have said and understand I am not trying to argue the
issue but offer some insight as to what I have found from my own
investigation. I don't consider myself to be an expert but the information
I gave I believe to still be true and have consulted the manufacturers and
my distributors for their advice and understanding of the rules and
proposals to new rule making.
You are correct in that the new 406 ELT's will broadcast on 121.5 as well,
also as a side note the 121.5 ELT's also already broadcast on 243.0 MHz.


Suggesting that marine
EPIRBs are the same as Aircraft 406 ELTs is the worst kind of
obfuscation.

I never stated these EPIRBs were in any way the same as Aircraft ELT's, in
fact what I said or tried to say was these were NOT and should not be
confused with Aircraft ELT's and I in fact stated just a couple of the
differences.Please also note that I do not, and have not ever offered or
suggested using anything but Aircraft type ELT's in aircraft......

While they take advantage of the same satellite
resources, the boxes themselves are very different. A sunset date for
121.5 satellite coverage has been set for February of 2009. As I've
noted, there are many other reasons the 406 units are better. These
are just a few. There are also diffences in
unit-to-satellite-to-receiving station visibility, accuracy, and time
to verification of signal. Not the least factor is the false alarm
rate, which introduces an adminstrative delay when any 121.5 signal
appears. Here's a snip from the SARSAT link.

For more information look at
http://www.artex.net/images/pdfs/121phaseout.pdf from Artex, who BTW is one
of the manufacturers I have spoken with about these issues.


"Different types of ELTs are currently in use. There are approximately
170,000 of the older generation 121.5 MHz ELTs in service.
Unfortunately, these have proven to be highly ineffective. They have a
97% false alarm rate, activate properly in only 12% of crashes, and
provide no identification data. In order to fix this problem 406 MHz
ELTs were developed to work specifically with the Cospas-Sarsat
system. These ELTs dramatically reduce the false alert impact on SAR
resources, have a higher accident survivability success rate, and
decrease the time required to reach accident victims by an average of
6 hours.


I'd still like to see where these statistics come from, I see the print, but
nothing to substantiate this, it sounds to me like this is coming from
someone who is trying to politicize this and is pushing for this.........I'd
really like to see something more graphic with these statistics.
From my own experience, I have not heard of any ELT failures to transmit, at
least not in ELT equipped gliders......have you????? Can you name just
one?????
I have however heard of several instances where ELT's have be useful and
have triggered in crashed gliders...
There have also been several "False ELT signals" this we can verify, and in
fact this has been somewhat of a problem with ELT's being set off by hard
landings and even gliders being trailered, which tends to suggests they can
and do go off rather easily and should function in a crash, not the
reverse.......also, even new 406 ELT's will also be prone to this since any
and all ELT's will still be designed around this same triggering
system.(G-Switch)

Understand, I am not trying to argue against 406 ELT's.sounds like a good
idea to me, but they will not become a standard for some time, even 2009 is
still 6 years away and many potential owners will by then have changed
gliders and moved on....the 121.5 MHz ELT's are until then a very good and
affordable option for anyone who is concerned ...making any rule to require
glider owners to install $1500 ELT's to participate in a contest I think is
going to meet with a lot of resistance and should any rule like this pass, I
think contest participation will decline...on the other hand, should a
contest organizer require the installation of a less than $200 ELT I think
many potential participants may just decide this is not at all a bad thing
and go ahead with an installation that can and has proven to be useful
Respectfully....
Tim Mara



Due to the obvious advantages of 406 MHz beacons and the significant
disadvantages to the older 121.5 MHz beacons, the International
Cospas-Sarsat Program have made a decision to phaseout 121.5 MHz
satellite alerting on February 1st, 2009. All pilots are highly
encouraged both by NOAA and by the FAA to consider making the switch
to 406!"

Apologies Tim, I read in more posturing than was obviously there.
Clearly you are aware of pilots who, to reduce cost, might seek marine
systems to carry in their gliders. This hadn't even occured to me.

One point worth revisiting, however, is the intent of SARSAT to cease
121.5 support in 2009. Another point is the use of small, cheap,
personal 121.5 ELTs, typically strapped to the parachute. My
undestanding is that these are all manually operated. As a vendor, you
must satisfy demand for such devices, but they clearly suffer the same
disadvantages you noted for GPS PLBs, and offer none of the benefits
of accurate positioning or timely interpretation of signal.

For years we've heard proponents of ELTs cite them as lifesaving
devices. In any accident which causes serious injury, the first hour
is absolutely critical to survival. If we are going to discuss ELTs as
pilot safety devices, then we need to differentiate the choices very
carefully. If we instead view them as search (but not necessarily
rescue) facilitators, then we have more latitude in our choices. As
for my own research, a 406 ELT with a coupled GPS seems the best (and,
of course, most expensive) overall solution. I would also be tempted
to have a GPS PLB on or in my parachute. As I would carry such a unit
for sailing or back country skiing/hiking, it seems a reasonable added
expense.

no problem and thanks for your comments.
I have been a proponent of ELT's in gliders ever since I heard the contest
lectures years ago offered by UH (Uncle Hank) and others and it was at their
urging I stated carrying these in stock and BTW have installed them on some,
though honestly, not all of the gliders that I have owned. If I were
actively flying more XC and especially contest flying I would definitely
have one installed.
I think there is a real benefit to installing ELT's, even the current 121.5
MHz units especially at the low cost and eventually, we will see as the 406
ELT's become more in demand the prices I suspect on these too will come
down.
I also think it's good to have an open dialog and even though RAS is not the
only source for this discussion a lot of pro's and con's can be openly
discussed here. I don't take offense to any of the comments and also know we
don't always get our points across as well in a typed email as we would
face to face but these discussions are useful if we don't let them be taken
as personal attacks.
thanks
tim

"Chris OCallaghan" wrote in message
m...
Apologies Tim, I read in more posturing than was obviously there.
Clearly you are aware of pilots who, to reduce cost, might seek marine
systems to carry in their gliders. This hadn't even occured to me.

One point worth revisiting, however, is the intent of SARSAT to cease
121.5 support in 2009. Another point is the use of small, cheap,
personal 121.5 ELTs, typically strapped to the parachute. My
undestanding is that these are all manually operated. As a vendor, you
must satisfy demand for such devices, but they clearly suffer the same
disadvantages you noted for GPS PLBs, and offer none of the benefits
of accurate positioning or timely interpretation of signal.

For years we've heard proponents of ELTs cite them as lifesaving
devices. In any accident which causes serious injury, the first hour
is absolutely critical to survival. If we are going to discuss ELTs as
pilot safety devices, then we need to differentiate the choices very
carefully. If we instead view them as search (but not necessarily
rescue) facilitators, then we have more latitude in our choices. As
for my own research, a 406 ELT with a coupled GPS seems the best (and,
of course, most expensive) overall solution. I would also be tempted
to have a GPS PLB on or in my parachute. As I would carry such a unit
for sailing or back country skiing/hiking, it seems a reasonable added
expense.

Sorry I'm late in responding to this one, but have been at Parowan. Awesome,
300 milers on most days with top speed 101 mph and remember nobody was allowed
to carry any water. Think we have a new Western Nats site.

As for the ELT thing, I flew with one strapped to the right riser of my
parachute. Got it from Aircraft Spruce & Specialty, last Christmass for $160
bucks.

In Vietnam we carried two ELT's, called them beepers, one under each arm and a
S&W 38 tucked away in back. I told our PE guy to keep the 38 and give me 3
beepers, because the ONLY way you were coming out of the jungle was to "come
up beeper".

My ELT isn't crash activated, but I wouldn't hesitate to turn it on before a
questionable landing, as "in the trees". Can always turn it off later if things
worked out OK. I'm told air-liners monitoe 121.5, give out about 20 seconde of
beeper and the call, in the clear. This is glider JJ, I have crashed at
______________, send help.

Spruse & Specialty also sells a strobe light for $50 bucks, pack that away
along with 3 quarts of bottled water and a hymnal.

Beautiful scenery at Parowan, lots of Grand Canyon looking stuff, everywhere.
Charlie seems in good shape and ornery as usual. An unidentified pilot accused
him of being "grumby", to which Charlie replied. "I'm not grumpy and the SOB
that said that should mind his own business". Good to have him back.
JJ Sinclair

(Chris OCallaghan) wrote in message om...

One point worth revisiting, however, is the intent of SARSAT to cease
121.5 support in 2009. Another point is the use of small, cheap,
personal 121.5 ELTs, typically strapped to the parachute. My
undestanding is that these are all manually operated. As a vendor, you
must satisfy demand for such devices, but they clearly suffer the same
disadvantages you noted for GPS PLBs, and offer none of the benefits
of accurate positioning or timely interpretation of signal.

This report is worth a read before you rush out and buy an integrated GPS 406 PLB.

http://www.equipped.org/406_beacon_test_toc.htm


Andy