Information Bulletin
Information Bulletin ISSUE 23 - FEBRUARY 2011 Register your Beacon It Might Save your Life! In August 2009, an Australian yachtsman on a solo With the phase-out of Cospas-Sarsat satellite alerting ocean voyage unexpectedly found himself in distress services at 121.5 MHz in 2009, 2010 was the first year when his yacht overturned off the coast of Australia. where the beacon population consisted solely of After assessing his situation, he activated his 406 MHz 406 MHz beacons, all with the potential to be regis- PLB to urgently summon assistance. Unfortunately, he tered. And yet, despite the importance of beacon regis- had not registered his beacon. tration, a consistent 30% of the global beacon popula- tion remains unregistered. Beacon owners need to verify Mike Barton, Chief of 1,000,000 the Australian Rescue 26% Coordination Centre NonNon registered registered population said “Unregistered bea- 900,000 cons really delay search RegisteredRegistered population population 241,770 800,000 action, therefore putting 30% the survivors at greater risk of not being rescued 700,000 in time. In this recent 29% 226,473 incident, the Australian 600,000 MCC received an unreg- 29% 500,000 176,133 istered, unlocated alert 28% The figure on top of each bar represents the percentage from the New Zealand 142,182 400,000 of the global beacon population28% that is not registered. GEOLUT at around mid- 32% 118,395 704,047 night. RCC Australia 35% 35% 106,990 300,000 108,391 109,132 was unable to immedi- 35% 527,978 ately respond, because 99,508 200,000 87,702 424,056 the PLB was not regis- 353,652 311,293 tered, therefore infor- 204,868 272,143 100,000 232,609 mation on the owner or 162,798 184,992 where they might be was unavailable.
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