The recent introduction of the "TracMe Personal Locator Beacon" is causing confusion among consumers. If you are thinking of buying one to serve as your distress beacon...DON'T!

TracMe is NOT a 406 MHz Personal Locator Beacon.

TracMe is not a distress beacon at all. TracMe does not notify authorities you are in distress or provide location information.

TracMe is not suitable for use on backcountry adventures, in aviation or boating or for similar situations where distress alerting may be critical.

Doug Ritter examines the issues involved and explains why this misleading name could end up killing people. Doug reviews the critical differences between a real 406 MHz PLB and this homing beacon. TracMe may well have a place in the effort to save lives, but read Doug's commentary and you decide if TracMe is doing the right thing by calling their device a PLB:

http://www.equipped.org/blog/?p=65

If you feel strongly about this issue after reading the article, you might want to let the TracMe CEO know how you feel. An email link is provided at the end of the article.

Please help spread this around the web; help to get the word out and save lives.

Wow, at $150 that device seems over priced even.

Def. something everyone should be aware of!!

So they are esentially saleing a less powerful frs radio that has a chip that repeats the same message over and over in hope someone will hear it, I'd rather have the radio that way I could talk to someone and tell them where I am or at least be able to describe my surroundings. Maybe someone should warn them that karma can bite them in the rear for marketing this thing.

Yeah, the moniker "Personal Distress Beacon" would also be an accurate general description (as would "Personal Piece of Junk", IMHO). It is my belief that they are using the PLB name intentionally, and trying to take advantage of the PLB's high price to appear like a low-cost alternative.

To be fair, there are many instances where a simple homing beacon might be appropriate and far better than nothing at all. It may well be a useful tool for the right circumstances and persons.

For a comm radio to be useful, you have to know where you are, so in most cases you also need GPS or some other means of identifying your location. In many situations the description of your surroundings could be useless. "I'm in a forest with a lot of trees, can't see anything but trees."

You could, theoretically, outfit a scout troop or young children with this device and perhaps we'd lose less of both if they could be more easily found. However, then there's the price issue. At less than $50 it would be easier to make a case for it. But, In any case, that's a totally separate consideration from the naming issue. I'll be addressing that in the full evaluation

Judging from what I read on their website and my experience with ELT's, DFing one of these on the ground with the equipment they describe would be a very slow process. And if you're close enough to be in range, you're probably standing on the person you're looking for.

Perhaps they should call it a BLB - "Body Locator Beacon"

Donate the $150 to your local SAR team to help support their air-scent search dogs. Its a much better investment. Both methods require someone to know you're missing and both need to get pretty close to you before they start working. But the dog will find you faster and you don't have to carry or activate a beacon.

However, also to be fair, don't current (actual) PLBs come with a homing beacon? Isn't that what the 121.5 MHz portion of their signal is supposed to be? It allows Search and Rescue personnel to home in on the distressed person(s) location using equipment they already have, as opposed to using separate, proprietary, and probably expensive direction finding equipment.

Certainly not trying to butt heads with you, but I don't feel like there's any obligation to "be fair" to TracMe. Their product is hokey at best, and could cost people their lives. If an FRS homing beacon were feasible and practical, I would think that it would be built into FRS radios.

Granted, I understand your point that it could prove useful in certain circumstances. However, those circumstances are outside official Search and Rescue operations in my opinion. Unfortunately, that is not the demographic that TracMe seems to be marketing to.

The difficulty with that proposition is that a real PLB is 3 to 5 times the cost and nearly 7 times the weight. You certainly aren't going to hand your 6-year old a PLB (I would hope).

I won't argue that this approach has some significant issues, which I'll review in depth in my evaluation of the device, but it may well have its place.



You may have no such obligation. I do.



The device, per se, is not the problem. The problem is what they are calling it. That's what's more likely to cost lives.



I don't think that one follows the other. Lots of things that seem very obvious after the fact lie right under our noses for years, sometimes decades, before someone gets a why-didn't-I-think-of-that bright idea. In any case, if your FRS radio is working, you'd likely try calling someone. In fact,there is a movement to make Channel 1 a common distress frequency, but it's been slow to gain traction. But that's really beside the point.

Conceptually, TracMe has some merit, IMHO. Not without significant obstacles and problems, mind you. Whether they have approached it the best way is open to debate. Whether the pricing is reasonable is another question as well. Whether it will ever take off and gain enough market to make it viable is yet another question. It truly is as good an example of the chicken or egg problem you're likely to see anytime soon.

Thank you for elaborating and responding to my comments. I look forward to your full evaluation in the future. Hopefully it'll shed much more light on TracMe's good and bad points.

doug,

fyi, in your blog, at the bottom, the link to 'acr electronics' does not work - the url the link supplies has two "e"s, as in acreelectronics vs acrelectronics. fine point, but it makes a difference.

keep up your work, i appreciate the time and effort you expend.

bsmith

Dang! I thought I checked all those before making it live. Oh well, fixed now, thanks for the head's up.

I really don't understand why the !@#)#* computer can't read my mind and type what I meant to type instead of what my fingers decide to do on their own. <g>

FWIW, I would think something like the Garmin Astro dog tracking system would be much better technology (yes, more expensive) for this type of issue. Strap one of these puppies to the top of everyone's pack, and off you go.

The gotcha is the use of line-of-sight radio, which adds a serious limitation.

I'd love to see something like the Garmin Astro, but with some sort of satellite packet data for the updates.

Heck, if you had something like that, and then added an emergency button on it, you could have quite an effective tool for hikers, SAR, wilderness firefighters and even tracking your dogs while out in the woods.

-john

I would encourage anyone who feels that this misrepresentation potentially endangers the consumer to file a complaint with the FTC and the sooner the better! Can't say more than that.

https://rn.ftc.gov/pls/dod/wsolcq$.startup?Z_ORG_CODE=PU01

Besides all the technical things people have mentioned: $150 for what is essentially a really stripped down FRS radio? They gotta be kidding!

Based on my experience with FRS range in even fairly open conditions, with more than 50mW, this "PLB" system has got to be totally relying on some very sensitive and I presume expensive RDF receivers. That aren't out there.

It seems to me almost like selling GPS receivers before the first GPS satellite was launched. Telling people how it would show their location exactly etc. etc., yet there not actually being any means to do that yet.

IOW you are selling safety (and maybe security) that doesn't really exist, it's a false sense and IMO bad because it may prevent you from doing something better.

The vast majority of consumers have no idea how their electronic gadgets work. Even things like cell phones...forget about communications radios or GPS or PLBs. They take it on faith. I am sure certain people are counting on that. People who are informed would not be fooled by this and would get a real PLB, they're not the issue.

If FRS channel 1 became an emergency standard, wouldn't ANY cheap FRS radio be just as good as TracMe, and a bit more flexible too?

I think selling RDF gear for cell phones would probably be more useful to more people, and would save more people. But then this company wouldn't have their own market.
Edit: obviously this would be more complicated as there's many more transmission options with cell phones. I just suggested them because more people (especially kids) have them these days, and probably always with them too.

I too am looking forward to the review. I was in the plane behind Doug during part of the testing, and have some comments that I'll append to full review discussion.

Let's hope that most people will balk at the obscenely high price tag and pass on the purchase of this thing. Of course, if this thing actually makes it to stores, we can educate the management/sales staff regarding the difference between it and the real PLBs and mention their liability should someone try to use it in a rescue situation. Just a thought.

FYI, noticed that this has been posted on digg:

http://digg.com/gadgets/Bogus_Locator_Beacon_A_Useless_Toy

Only one comment and digg so far...

TRACEME has submitted registration for the Forum. I have approved their request. I will monitor any threads VERY carefully. Please remember this is a survival forum and not roman, though I think the lions are smelling the wind.

Has anyone checked out another "PLB-like" product that was announced yesterday?

Its called the "spot". Check it out at the following URLs:

1.Media announcement: (http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site...amp;newsLang=en)

2. Company page: (http://www.findmespot.com/)

Supposedly it uses GPS to broadcast your coordinates to a website for friends, family and emergency services. Its relatively cheap ($150) and requires a subscription. It should be released for sale this November. This company also makes some pretty steep claims of reliability. Hopefully its not another false assurance sold to unsuspecting outdoor consumers like the TraceMe product. Perhaps this should be Doug's next blog entry ;^).

Cheers,

I'll be meeting with the SPOT folks at Outdoor Retailer later this week. I'll have more in my OR report.

Wow! That was fast. You really are on top of this stuff! Bravo.

I guess it was only a matter of time before a private company would offer something like the spot. Will they be charging monthly fees for the message relaying to authorities is another question...

I have filed my FTC complaint...have you? Be responsible and protect your fellow consumers today! (cue drum beating here) ;^)

Cheers,
~Logan.

Hi Doug,

The term 'Personal Locator Beacon' has been around for a very long time now. I can remember reading a patent for a Personal Locator Beacon, which was developed by a UK company for the Apollo Space Program in the 1960s, which could not be described in anyway in the modern technological sense as being a 406MHz PLB. The electronic sophistication revolution moves forward, legal patent language it appears does not. TracMe does have an International patent for the device they are trying to market which is described in its patent title as a 'Personal Locator Beacon'. The technology TracMe is using is a retrograde step in PLB design and has none of the advanced sophistication of a 406MHz PLB, but the TracMe device is a 'Personal Locator Beacon' device despite its obvious limitations. The TracMe device despite its limitations could prove to be quite useful in a small scale area search. An example could be the case of a US army soldier who was lost during a navigational exercise in Texas earlier this year but who had unfortunately died. The TracMe device may well have saved this mans life or at least resulted in the recovered of his body much more quickly. The cost of outfitting full 406Mhz PLBs for groups of children or even groups of soldiers on exercise would be prohibitive and would expose the main downside of these devices, that of accidental activation leading to false alarm and the associated costs for SAR.

I fully agree that the TracMe device use of the term ‘Personal Locator Beacon’ is misleading or unfortunate in relation to a full 406MHz PLB, but I do doubt that this device is going to end up killing people because of the marketing term ‘Personal Locator Beacon’ used by TracMe. Anyone who purchases such a device from TracMe and confuses their purchase to that of a full 406MHz PLB probably shouldn’t be purchasing either of them. The manual on the TracMe website for the TracMe device is very specific about what the device is and what the device is not. If these folks cannot read and understand the differences between the TracMe device and a full 406MHz PBL, then owning a full 406 MHz PLB probably isn’t going to do much good for them either way and will actually end up as a headache for the SAR authorities because of inappropriate activation.

A cell phone is probably a much more appropriate device for most folks on a jaunt into the woods or into the hills rather than a full 406MHz PLB. Even cell phones are abused in the 'Its got a little bit misty on the top of this hill, I don't know which way to go and could you send one of those big bright yellow helicopters to take me off the hill!!' type scenarios.

As folks think they can disregard their personal safety in the wilderness together with not having the appropriate survival skills such as navigation, thinking that they can rely on their electronic fall back insurance, probably results in more loss of life than falling foul of not purchasing the right PLB insurance (either a Full 406MHz PLB or TracMe device) in the first place.

406MHz PLBs certainly have there place, but thinking why and when they are deployed and by who is deploying them is very important also. I would have to say that if everyone who ventured into the wilderness carried a full 406MHz PBL then the whole 406MHz PLB system would become unworkable and therefore pointless.

Hmm, were I to make a comparison in marketing fraud, I would say someone who sells cordless phones calling their product a cell phone would be about the same as in this case.

As for the widespread use of real PLBs creating an unworkable system, researching the use of the technology more ought to lead you to a far different conclusion. Again, that would be like saying that too many people using cell phones makes the system unusable.

From the diagram we can see the problem that would be caused from widespread use of 406MHz PLB technology. There are three distress calls coming in simultaneously but only one helicopter. A sinking boat, a crashed aircraft, and a hillwalker who has pressed his electronic hiking insurance panic button because he can't use a map and compass

I would tend to disagree, that 3 (or even a few more) isolated calls would cause the rescue response system to become overwhelmed. Yes, in a regional/state disaster situation, rescue resources can and do become overwhelmed at times. That is why transfer/fill-in, mutual aid, emergency management agency compacts (EMACs) and memos of understanding (MOUs) charters/agreements are in place. Whenever there is an activation of the emergency response system, a backup system/agency is physically moved, placed on alert or moved up within the computer assisted dispatch systems (CAP) to handle the next due call.

This occurs daily in many jurisdictions, an ambulance is dispatched, and another call(s) comes in at the same time or just after. If the station does not have another ambulance, then the next closest unit is dispatched. If resources in a particular area are exhausted on a call(s), such as a high-life hazard incident, then resources are alerted/moved up to cover/fill-in those stations that are depleted.

If a particular aviation (or other rescue resource) rescue resource is tied up, then the next due unit is alerted, dispatched or moved to cover the area. The increase in cell phone use has certainly increased the calls coming into emergency/dispatch communication centers, but the increase in actually emergencies is determined more by population density and life style then cell phone use. Likewise, the increase in use of PLBs might lead to more activation of emergency services by this specific method, but the same PLB user may have previously activated the system by phone, radio, cell phone or runner in the past. A substantial increase in the activation of rescue resources solely due to an increase in the number of PLBs users is unlikely.

Pete

More SPOT debate by the backpackers. There is a $99 yearly fee or a monthly fee.

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/xdpy/forum_thread/9048/index.html

Any word on when we might hear something from D. Ritter on his thoughts?

Hope to post my Outdoor Retailer Report this weekend, which will include a report on the SPOT Satellite Messenger.

Since you have to pay the extra fee for the extra features, why not not just purchase a PLB and bring your cell phone. Granted your cell phone is less likely to get a signal out depending on your location (than say a sat phone) but for just checking in to say "honey, I'm fine" I could do with that.

After a couple years of subscription you are almost at the same price you paid for the satellite based PLB anyway so what type of sucker is this guy pitching his equipment to?

Personally, I think wait a year or two for the PLBs to come down a bit more in price and size then maybe I'll get one.

Actually, I think the SPOT is fairly compelling (so I guess *this* sucker). I'm 100% for PLBs, but I think the ability to send data updates including location via satellite is a great feature.

Consider if your party is just taking longer than expected but you do not have an emergency. You could prevent a costly rescue attempt and prevent loved ones worry.

I can see them useful in non-outback situations as well. For example if there were ever a large earthquake in the area I'm sure cell phone and land lines would be useless for some time. This way, you should still be able to get word out. And a lot cheaper than a sat phone.

Sure, it isn't as serious of a rescue device as the PLB. The PLB is inherently more reliable based on it's design, but it is also a one trick pony.

In regards to bringing a cell to check in, coverage is just too closely tied with civilization to make it a good tool for this. You simply can lose coverage too easily. Sat phone would be good, but too costly.

Personally, I'd want both a SPOT and a real PLB in my party.

-john


Of course, a two-way sat pager would probably be just as good. Do they make sat text messaging two way pagers?