For most people, yes, a PLB is a bad idea in my opinion. They have thier place, but if that is ALL you ever have, I'm not going to feel bad about whatever happened to you. PLBs, based on thier very nature, are best for things like aircraft, boats, and those who are going into the back of beyond. You know, places where there are usually only two ways in- by air, or walking/sailing a few days.

There is an old expression- failure to plan on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part. People are used to thier movies on demand and thier 20 minutes or its free pizza delivery. That's the kind of mentality that I see over and over when someone has a cell phone in the woods. The "Oh, if I get hurt, I'll call 911" theory is great if you are someplace where it works, like a metropolitan center. And if you are taking kids on a camping trip in Central Park, maybe it is valid. Where I camp, and where they take scouts around here, it isn't. Even if you were in range of the nearest cell towers, you have no LOS.

My opinions are based on having spent my life in a place where that idea doesn't work with landlines. YES, you do shout for help, but don't be suprised if you have to make due with just you, yourself and thou for a while before the cavalry shows up. If you can't, welcome to Statisticsville. That's why I am opposed to the complacency and unwillingness to manage your own life that seems to be a side effect of being able to push a button on a cell phone to summon help.

But that kind of mentality is the part of why todays children are, by the standard of a lot of us, screwed up. They are used to being able to shout for help and a "trained professional" will be there in minutes to bail them out. A cell or a radio for a leader, that's fine, as a back up. I'd recommend that strongly for the reasons you state and some you didn't. But a cell as a standard part of a kit, no, and absolutely NOT in the kit during a controlled and managed exercise being conducted for the purposes of actually teaching kids something more that praying to the radio gods for salvation.

Case in point- back a few weeks ago, I was in an outdoor store. It's only a few hours from here to Mt Washington by road. Some fool flatlander was buying boots to hike Washington. It isn't a super hard hike if you are in shape, but when the clerk asked this fellow if he had a back up plan, the fool pulled out his cell phone. Me and the guy behind the counter have known eachother for a long time. He can't laugh or he'd get fired; I could after asking a few more questions. New boots, no map, no sleeping bag, no shelter, no stove, but he had his cell and ipod. For those who don't know Washington, there isn't much shelter or natural fuel after about the halfway point, and it probably has the worst weather east of the Mississippi The rain that most of us have been getting in New England has been off and on freezing rain up at the top of Washington, with highs in the 40s at the peak. Now, it isn't a technical climb- you can follow the road, there is one that goes all the way to the top (and back down, if your brakes are good). But it is long, and you are exposed almost the entire way, and there isn't a lot of traffic on that road.

This clown was probably fine for a little day trek someplace were you can dial 911 and have a broken leg under an x-ray in under an hour. On Washington, forget it. I haven't heard of anyone going missing in the past few weeks. Maybe he got a clue after being mocked; maybe he has friends who bought him one. Maybe he got a quarter of the way up, decided that Washington was more than he could deal with. Maybe someone saw him with his thumb out on the side of the road and took pity on him. Maybe he scrubbed becuase it is the middle of the rainy season. Maybe he didn't tell anyone his plans and the mountains claimed him. I dont' know; I do know that he wasn't equipped last I saw him.

From the way I understood Jim's post, I thought that what he was suggesting was that every kid have a phone. And if I misunderstood, I'm sorry, Jim. But I stand by my claim that cell phones have no business being on in the woods or as part of the core equipment for emergencies. They are not reliable- if it has batteries or takes fuel, it will eventually fail you in a situation where that failure will kill you if you don't have a back up.

But hey, what do I know? I'm just a dumb country boy with an engineering degree that was heavy on communications and electronics as part of the minor. No, I wouldn't know anything about cell phones and thier malfunctions other than my lack of trust of any of the unholy contraptions of these new fangled times.