Glad he made it. Badly injured and helpless is pretty much my nightmare scenario.
Aside:
All of our cell phones are in my name. I wonder if I should write down a "living will" granting immediate access to my records. Otherwise it might take a court order and waste valuable time.
Something along the lines of:
"I ________ do hereby grant immediate access to my cell phone records [insert numbers here] and location by triangulation for the purposes of search and rescue upon submission of a written request by any of these individuals [list]. I understand that removing the battery in my phone will limit or defeat these systems and ensure my privacy should I wish to do so."
I hate to be a downer, but I think that living will idea would fail for a few reasons:
1. A living will is for providing directives/instructions to health care providers/caregivers in case you become incapacitated. I don't think a living will can be used to grant permissions over your property if you're missing.
2. If, instead, you're talking about a living trust, then you first have to be pronounced dead. Second, the trustee has to take action. That process is going to take more than a few days to carry out. Further, the cops/rescue services are not going to be the trustee of your trust.
3. I'm not totally sure if you are the sole owner of your cell phone records. For example, the cell phone company may be owner-in-part, and they will provide extra red tape and time consumption.
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Basically, there has got to be a better way. I have done no research on this issue, but I'm inclined to think that wills and trusts would only delay matters. Perhaps your state already has laws to access cell phone records if someone is missing for, say, 24 hours or so.
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