Glider accident near Altoona... interview with pilot

On May 14, 11:51*pm, Darryl Ramm wrote:
On May 14, 4:28*pm, ContestID67 wrote:

What seems really strange is the the rescurers didn't have a simple,
inexpensive, GPS so that they could zero in on the pilot quickly. *The
narrative indicates that the pilot had to guide them in via sound.
Even cell phones now have GPS. *This should be required equipment.

1. Did the PLB have a GPS?
2. Did the PLB have a GPS fix?

Foliage or other *could mean a PLB with GPS is unable to get a fix.
That or if the PLB does not have a GPS then then SARSAT relies on
(significantly less precise) doppler location. It is also at least
plausible that an alert process can be started before a triangulation
fix established.

If the ground SAR crew had 121.1 direction finder that may also have
helped triangulate on the PLB 121.5 Mhz beacon (all 406 Mhz ELTs and
PLBs also have 121.5 Mhz homing beacons), but with heavy foliage/steep
terrain that may have been more work/slower than the airhorns.

Darryl

Les’s comments in the AOPA web article are consistent with the
experiences with both the Peter Masak and Dale Kramer searches.
Although very high quality information (e.g. coordinates, elt signal,
knowledge of route being flown) may be available, there is a gap in
the ability of local non-aviation rescue (and even CAP) to accept and/
or use it effectively. Had Les not been able to respond to the sounds
made by the rescue team over his cellphone, it would have probably
taken much longer to find him as there is no indication that his
coordinates were either communicated to the rescue team or that they
had the capability to use them. However, I do not know whether SARSAT
actually got GPS coordinates from his PLB or they just estimated
coordinates from the PLB signal (a 406 Mhz elt signal without GPS
determines a search area of about 2 miles radius).

This reinforces the advantages of having something with you that makes
noise (elt, whistle, bike horn etc.) that is either automatically
activated or on the front of your chute.