UK Mountain Rescue Conference

[Lyle Brotherton]

Returned from yet another excellent UK Mountain Rescue Conference and, as always, I learned so much.

The conference program included seminars on everything from ‘National Search and Rescue Dog Association (NSARDA) Drowned Victim Search Dogs’, delivered by the very knowledgeable Iain Nicholson, to ‘Dealing with Avalanche Hazard in the UK’, presented by the world expert on the subject, Mark Diggins.

My old friend Tom Taylor, from the United Kingdom's Aeronautical Rescue Coordination Centre (ARCC) is based at RAF Kinloss, near Forres in Moray, gave an outstanding presentation ‘PLBs and Similar Devices’. Tom evaluates all PLBs & EPIRBs, both currently available and in-development for the RAF, his knowledge in this sphere is second to none. What I personally had not appreciated before his seminar, was that when you fire off your PLB (Personal Locator Beacon) ideally you should have a clear view of the southern sky, if operating in the northern hemisphere, and the converse when in the southern hemisphere to make the quickest link with the distress satellites, of which 5 are geostationary above the equator. The Low Earth orbiting satellites will eventually pick you up but it depends on the current orbital position in relation to your location. Simple advice yet potentially lifesaving.



Dave Heavy Whalley delivered another of his SAR (Search & Rescue) operational evaluation with lesson learned and to be learned from the past. His candour and forthrightness ruffles feathers at the highest rank, yet any man who has personally debriefed the Queen, 121, after the Pan Am Flight 103 disaster, at Lockerbie, and who was asked, by the then Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, to write an appraisal of the RAF’s MRT needs, has the credibility to say it as it is, and he does! It is a privilege to watch him speak; this man has taught me so much.



I experienced a slight elevation in stress levels, not something I usually encounter, when as the delegates were arriving for my 'Mountain Rescue & Terrorism' lecture, my secure USB would not recognise my fingerprint and therefore I could not access the presentation that I was just about to deliver. A BIG thank you to Ben for accessing the USB and saving my bacon

[Skills4Survival]

hands where that sweaty?    All really interesting stuff.

What I had not appreciated before his seminar was that when you fire off your PLB (Personal Locator Beacon) ideally you should have a clear view of the southern sky, if operating in the northern hemisphere, and the converse when in the southern hemisphere to make the quickest link with the distress satellites, of which 5 are geostationary above the equator

Can you tell me why that is why you would want to connect to the ones which are furhter away by default?, if I understand correctly.

[Callum]

Lyle, I am intrigued, and if you can’t let me know then sure I understand, but, what is the link between mountain rescue and terrorism?

[Lyle Brotherton]

Perpetrators of particular terrorist acts, in this instance Roving Random Shooters (in the UK we refer to them as Marauding Shooters), such as the incidents on Utoeya Island, Norway, last year and in Mumbai 2008, India, behave in very similar ways, and therefore predictably, irrespective of their age, nationality, ethnicity or motive. They all exhibited a distinct Behavioural Profile, both in the planning and execution of their crimes.

The empirical work underpinning my research reinforces the need for mountain rescue responders to use the Behavioural Profiles of the types of people they are searching for in exactly the same way. For example Alzheimer’s patients tend to continue traveling in a straight line until they encounter an obstacle they cannot pass, and very young children hide if they are lost and will not respond to calls from the MR responders, who are in effect strangers to them, unless they use the name of a cuddly toy belonging to the child.

Much of this data is available however much of it is also dated and with modern technologies, such as smartphone data, needs both updating and allows us to study in much greater detail the exact movements of different individual types. I am keen to drive this research with UK MRTs.

[Callum]

Thanks Lyle, now you state it is makes perfect sense, a bit like ‘cats-eyes’ anybody could have thought of it but nobody did until Percy Shaw of Boothtown, Halifax, had that spark of inspiration.

[Lyle Brotherton]

'Can you tell me why that is why you would want to connect to the ones which are furhter away by default?, if I understand correctly.'

Sure can Ivo, I have pinged Tom at the ARCC and asked if I can post some of his slides here, will keep you posted

[captain paranoia]

> Can you tell me why that is why you would want to connect to the ones which are furhter away by default?, if I understand correctly.

I think what Lyle is saying is that, since geostationary satellites orbit around the equator, you need to point your transmitter at the satellites orbiting at 36,000km around the equator.  Which mean you need to be able to see the 'southern sky'.  It also means that, just as for SBAS satellites, it becomes increasingly difficult to see the geo satellites the more north you go (in northern hemisphere, or south in southern hemisphere).

Geo satellites should be visible all the time. LEO satellites orbit, and so you may have to wait for one to come over...

[adi]

Yeap Paranoia has hit the nail on the head. The 406 mhz beacons work with geostationary satellites which fly over the Equator.

Here is an very old but interesting video, it explains why Cospas-Sarsat moved from London to Montreal back in 2005
http://article.wn.com/view/2005/11/10/Montreal_welcomes_the_headquarters_of_the_CospasSarsat_Progr/
 

[captain paranoia]

> The 406 mhz beacons work with geostationary satellites which fly over the Equator.

Just to clarify, because your comment 'flying over' suggests that the satellite passes overhead, geostationary satellites are fixed in position relative to a spot on the Earth; they orbital period is the same as that of the Earth, which is why there's a very tightly packed ring of satellites in that geostationary orbit.  It's getting so packed that it's nearly 'one out, one in...'

Since a single geostationary satellite is in a fixed position, it cannot provide global coverage (just like you cannot see all the surface of a football if you hold it in your hand).  So, we need a number of geostationary satellites to provide global coverage (if that's what we want to do).  Think of three people standing looking at the football, equally spaced out around the ball; together, they can see all the surface of the ball.

Then there's the 'footprint' of the satellite beam to consider; for various reasons, you may not want to beam the signal as far as you possibly can; mostly due to limited transmit power, and service licencing/utility issues.

An example might be the SBAS correction systems (WAAS, EGNOS, MSAS), which are broadcast by geostationary satellites.  Since these give 'local' corrections for each region, there's no point beaming WAAS to cover Europe or Asia.  So WAAS covers America, EGNOS Europe and MSAS Japan/Asia, and their satellites sit in the appropriate point of the geo orbit.

GNSS positioning satellites, on the other hand, and medium earth orbit satellites, that aren't in a fixed position in space relative to the Earth, and do move about; you can see this in the constellation view on a GNSS receiver.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medium_Earth_orbit

And low Earth orbit satellites, that whizz over the sky pretty quickly.  The International Space Station is a good example; it takes only a few minutes to transmit the sky.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_earth_orbit

[walter.schuit]

On the link between mountain rescue and terrorism: read the book "Wilderness evasion, a guide to hiding out and eluding pursuit in remote areas" by Michael Chesbro, to look at and understand the other side of the picture. The book gives some historic examples where criminals manage to hide in wilderness areas.

[adi]

Yeah good point they don't fly they are fixed.

[Lyle Brotherton]

Saw on Russia Today last night that China has just launched another two Compass/BeiDou satellites, and that they now have 15 in orbit out of a planned 35 satellites. They don’t hang around!

The most interesting news to me was that the system not only currently provides satnav for the Asia-Pacific region, but also emergency short message services. As far as I am aware we in the west will be able to use their GNSS broadcasts, the interesting component would be if we can send emergency SMS via the system?

If so this could be a much more effective, both in terms of cost and practicality, of sending a distress signal as well as your current location.

[Skills4Survival]

Do we then get SMS functionality in the GPS....? or a Phone with texting capabilities via satellite?

[adi]

I think the sensible aim is to have an all in one global system of mobile communication, sms, internet and location based systems in one small neat package. It would save billions on building, updating and managing outdated systems we have in place now.

Although it seems the cost of sending stuff to space is expensive  in reality it is pocket change compared to the infrastructural the western world has had to spend so far and their is still over half the planet missing out.

People worry about sun spots taking out our satellites but in a couple of years there will be spare ones stored in warehouse for just in case one need to be replaced suddenly. And lets be honest these satellites will end up the size of a mobile phone in the coming decade or so.