Not sure if this made the forum, however it was on the main AOPA page today:

If Maurice Kirk hadn’t been carrying a personal locator beacon (PLB) on Feb. 16 when his J-3 Cub went down more than 70 miles out to sea, he probably wouldn’t be alive today.


Full article here:
http://www.aopa.org/aircraft/articles/2008/080228elt.html

62 year old just surviving a ditching at sea is pretty darned good, but no doubt the PLB saved his bacon...

I know I wouldn't be flying a J-3, 70 miles out at sea!
Glad he got rescued. The article seemed to be aimed at blasting the FAA for wanting to switch to 406 from 121.5 units.

Aren’t planes required to have PLBs?

Most of us would never be in a small plane going out over the ocean, but it would be nice to know ahead of time if the plane had one and how it worked. Or have your own to take with you.


With the move to the 406 MHz ones, are the 121.5 MHz ones going to still be useful? And they may be coming on the used market (e-bay) and worth a look if they still have a way to be picked up.

I find it difficult to understand the AOPA's position on this issue.

406 MHz PLB's & ELT's should be mandatory aboard every aircraft. period.

The 121.5 MHz is unreliable and obsolete. I know I wouldn't rely on a 121.5 MHz ELT to save the day.

The FAA's and AOPA's positions are not as thoughtless as they might appear at first glance. You might want to take a look at this:

http://www.equipped.org/blog/?p=70

Mandatory upgrading to 406 MHz ELTs for General Aviation is simply not going to happen in the U.S. The potential return on investment simply isn't there. PLBs, OTOH, make a lot of sense.

U.S registered aircraft are required to have a 121.5 MHz ELT. An ELT generally doesn't do much good if the plane is ditched unless it floats, and few do. After Feb. 1, 2009, with no satellite alerting, the 121.5 MHz ELTs will be even more useless than now.

The FAA is not mandating replacement of 121.5 MHz ELTs with 406 MHz ELTs. Those that are removed, are generally being kept by the service center to sell to those needing to replace failed ones where the owner doesn't want to upgrade to 406 MHz due to the expense. Why you'd want one of those 121.5 MHz pieces of junk is another question altogether.

Since I'm not a pilot or aircraft owner, I really don't have a direct interest in what if any kind of locater should be required for planes. However, like everybody else I'm a taxpayer and I wonder about the cost of conducting search and rescue operations when the downed aircraft has no locater or one that is ineffective. Most of the AOPA's concern seems to be how much it would cost aircraft owners to install or upgrade ELT to 406 MHz ELT's. What am I missing in their argument?

That ELTs are rarely used, when used they often, if not generally, don't work, and the cost to upgrade is out of proportion to the value rec'd.

But, given your hypothesis, I assume you would have no problem with the government mandating that you, and everyone else who goes out into any wilderness area, purchase and carry a PLB while hiking/camping to reduce the cost of SAR operations. It's only a few hundred bucks and think how much time, effort and money would be saved by SAR?

The fact is that there is a limit to what we, as a society and as individuals, are willing to do/spend to ameliorate the costs to us from necessary (or at least, traditional) govt. services. Drawing the line is what representative govt. is all about. Theoretically, the balance that comes from all sides looking out for their own agendas and thereby arriving at the solution will be a reasonable compromise. Theory doesn't always work, but...

(deleted political diatribe)

Back to the subject. Being in a small GA aircraft I suspect ELT's can be buried under aluminum sheeting or sink if the plane is ditched and become not very useful. A PLB makes a lot of sense for GA, but PLB's won't be mandated by the FAA because they aren't part of the plane. 406 MHz PLB's are cheaper than 406 MHz ELT's also because they aren't part of the plane. Check ELT prices on the web and understand that those are uninstalled prices. All that money spent and after a crash an ELT might not work anyway.