Thus my suggestion for a striker-fired .45. That doesn't work for everyone -- pistols that work well for me don't work at all for other people, and vice versa. Every pistol class I've ever taught has had at least one student with a gun that was wrong for him or her. I recently took an advanced class with the same issue -- you'd think that someone who made it to the advanced class would have a gun that he could shoot!



Fastfind runs around $250, lasts for five years without battery replacement, and carries no subscription fee. You do need to register it. It has two modes, "off" and "mayday!" COSPAS/SARSAT runs the satellites and the United States Air Force runs the Rescue Coordination Center.

InReach runs $300, takes AAs and requires a subscription starting at $10/mo. It lets you send tracking information, and text messages. During an emergency you can not only send the "mayday" with your location, you can communicate interactively with GEOS. GEOS is a private rescue coordination center. They don't have as long a track record as AFRCC but they've got some good saves to their name.



If you're on a boat, you should have a marine handheld. If you're a pilot and flying places, you should consider an aviation handheld. If you're flying over water, you should consider having both.

If neither the boat nor the aircraft are in your plan, your best bet may be an amateur radio (ham) handheld, depending on your location. For that you'd need to get an amateur radio license.

While you cannot legally transmit from an amateur radio on the marine or aviation bands normally, it's legal for a licensed amateur to transmit out of band in a life-threatening emergency when that's the best way to pass emergency traffic. With that said, as a ham, I would carry a marine radio for boat use -- I'm not a pilot, so I'm not licensed to transmit on aviation bands.