Personal locator beacons cleared for land use

[Osbacky]

Personal locator beacons (PLBs) have previously been restricted for use at sea and by aircraft crews have just recently been cleared for land use . lives could potentially be saved, giving potential benefits for forestry workers, estate workers, service engineers as well as people involved in outdoor pursuits.

[Phill]

Not wanting to hijack thread, but:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-16528205

For those not really aware the significance of this is quite large, it could save many people and aircraft spending large amounts of time searching for casualties.

[changilass]

Why was their use restricted in the first place?

[Phill]

I think a combination of legacy issues surrounding licensing of radio transmissions and the fact that PLB's are using technology affectively.

Older emergency beacons just transmitted a tone, mostly on 121.5Mhz (in relation to your wireless, Radio 1 is 97-99) and this falls within a licensed part of the radio spectrum, so in theory you need to get a licence to use one. Also these needed a lot of work to triangulate the beacon and you had to be in close range.

PLB's however use a different frequency and system (google COSPAS-SARSAT) and transmit an ID. A bit of satellite jiggerypokery and the signal can be pinpointed to a few metres within about 30-40 mins, potentially a lot faster, some systems will transmit the GPS location.

Because PLB's have a unique ID they can be registered to a user with contact details etc. so when used 'in anger' information is A, known and B, can be confirmed quickly. Furthermore it helps prevent malicious beacons and can very quickly identify and reject erroneous beacons.