Kitplanes Magazine SPOT article from EAA AirVenture 2008

In more EAA AirVenture 2008 news from Oshkosh, Kitplanes magazine has done a good and brief writeup of SPOT. Visit Kitplanes for the whole article. 

Here’s an excerpt: 

“Spot, originally developed for backpackers and back country skiers, is a natural in the airplane. “The first thing I did with it was throw it in my Cherokee 140,” says Wilkenson. “It worked. When I pressed the OK button it sent a message, via text and email, to let people on my list know the lat/long of my departure and that I was OK. There’s also a link to a private Google Maps page where they can track me. Hold that button down again, watch for flashing lights, and I know it has gone to tracking mode,” he says. “Then it issues updates every 10 minutes or so, with my lat/long. When I reach my destination, I hit the OK button once more and it sends a message so people know I’ve landed safely. But that’s just the tracking mode. What makes this little device great are the HELP and 911 buttons. Push HELP and you’ll send out a non-emergency, ‘you need to come get me’ notice. It’s very popular with glider pilots who might land out. Push 911 and we will activate search-and-rescue in your vicinity immediately,” he says. ”

EAA News: AVweb podcast interview with SPOT PR Manager Derek Moore

In EAA Airventure 2008 News, AVWeb posted an interesting interview with SPOT PR Manager Derek Moore, recorded in OshKosh. 

http://www.avweb.com/podcast/podcast/EAAAirVenture2008_AudioPodcast_DerekMoore_Spot_198407-1.html

SPOT used to update maps on TripSailor sailing blogs

Everyday, we run across someone who has found another use for SPOT. Today we shine the light on TripSailor – a free blogging community for Sailors that uses SPOT shared pages to update Tripsailor sailing blogs. The blogs make it easy to connect with others using photos, videos, maps, and of course, SPOT. Connecting your SPOT with your Tripsailor blog is easy, and a Tripsailor account is free. To use SPOT with Tripsailor, follow their simple directions:  http://help.tripsailor.com/index.php?id=spotmessenger

Track planes going to EAA 2008; B-17, Ford Tri-motor, J.W. French

 

EAA AirVenture 2008 logo

 

 

For the EAA Airventure 2008, the SPOT has outfitted key planes with SPOT satellite messengers for GPS tracking and flight following. Starting immediately, aviation fans can follow along online in real time at the SPOT website.  http://www.findmespot.com/eaa.aspx

Planes to track include:

 

B-17 Flying Fortress Thunderbird (Lone Star Flight Museum)

Click the title or picture to see the SPOT shared page. The B-17 Flying Fortress was used by the Army Air Corps to fly strategic bombing missions over Europe during World War II. The four-engine, heavy-duty bomber was armed with .50 caliber machine guns and 5,000 pounds of bombs. Over the course of the war, 13,000 B-17s were produced, of which only 13 are still airworthy today.    Thunderbird currently resides at the Lone Star Flight Museum in Galveston, Texas, and is painted in the colors of one of the aircraft from the 303rd bomb group.

 

 

Ford Tri-Motor 4AT-A (Greg Herrick/Golden Wings Museum)

Courtesy of Airport Journals Click the title or picture to see the SPOT shared page.  The Ford Tri-motor, nicknamed “The Tin Goose,” was an American three-engine civil transport aircraft first produced in 1925 by Henry Ford. The Ford Tri-motor used an all-metal construction, which was beyond the standard in the 1920s. Its wings were made of aluminum and corrugated for added strength. More than 100 worldwide airlines flew the Ford Tri-motor while it was in production. Before Greg Herrick acquired the 4AT-A, it was flown by Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart, and made the first commercial flights from the U.S. to Mexico City and over the Canadian Rockies. After obtaining it in the mid-1980s, Herrick began restoring the tri-motor after years of preservation. As of 2006, the Tri-motor has been in flying condition and restored to its December 1927 appearance. Herrick’s Tri-motor is the oldest flying type example of the 18 remaining aircraft in the world.

 

Visit http://www.findmespot.com/eaa.aspx for a complete list.

New search for Steve Fossett GPS tracked online with SPOT messenger

 

On September 3, 2007, Steve Fossett, the multi-millionaire record-breaking aviator, went missing when his single engine plane disappeared in Nevada. A month later, the official search was called off. On Monday, July 14, 2008, a team led by Dr. Simon Donato set off to tackle the Sierra Nevada Mountains to find the wreckage and put closure to this mystery. 

http://adventurescience.ca/follow-the-team.html Track Simon and his team as they use SPOT technology for safety messaging and location updates. 

Dr. Donato will lead his small crew in a high intensity 8-day long ground search for Steve Fossett’s crash site. They will test Donato’s hypothesis that the wreckage is in their search area. They will be pushing their physical and mental limits as they cover hundred’s of kilometers during the search and aim to set a new standard in search and rescue. The team possesses the mental toughness and physical fitness to conduct large-scale ground searches quickly, which is what sets this team apart from ordinary folks. They will pack lightly, move quickly, and suffer extremes. They will explore the unexplored.

Although the team will use all-terrain vehicles when possible, the majority of the search will be conducted on foot in order to allow the team to explore difficult areas where vehicles and previous searchers were unable to reach. Conducting the search this way will allow them to reach the areas shrouded by tree cover, shaded by towering cliffs and canyons that prevented satellites and aircraft from successfully surveying.

SPOT & Primal Quest press conference at Outdoor Retailer date

SPOT and Primal Quest will be presenting at Outdoor Retailer.

Date: Friday, August 8, 2008 3:00 pm 

Place: Paddle Lounge, Salt Palace, Salt Lake City, Utah, Outdoor Retailer Summer Show  

After the presentation, come by our booth 188 & 190, in the main hallway outside the main hall. 

We’ve had a lot of great feedback from fans of Primal Quest lately, but the best testimony comes from the Primal Quest Race Operations Director, Greg Vogel: 

“Primal Quest Montana was a 10-day expedition-level adventure race, with 58 teams challenging each other and the Montana mountains over a 548 mile course.  Try to imagine keeping track of 232 world-class athletes spread out over this course, and then reporting their progress to the world at any one time.  PQ was fortunate to partner with SPOT for GPS tracking.  Their motto is “Live to tell about it” – a fit motto for a partner in such a grueling race.

 

In addition to providing a safer race for the participants, the SPOT tracking services made it possible for race officials and spectators, as well as fans on the website, to follow the progress of the entire field moving through the race course.   Their assistance in designing the Leaderboard and Tracking sections of our website gave us results that exceeded our expectations. 

 

The team from SPOT provided outstanding service, and the quality of the product they delivered was far better than we could have imagined. The entire experience was a very good one for us, and we look forward to partnering with them again for next year’s race.”

In addition – Tim Soyars, Medical Director summed up how SPOT helped out his team during Primal Quest: 

“SPOT takes the “Search” out of “Search and Rescue”. “

SPOT successfully tracks Kent Couch at Couchballoons.com

Here’s one straight out of Mythbusters: Kent Couch used a lawn chair and helium cluster balloons to travel from Bend, OR to Boise Idaho. How to descend? A well-aimed BB gun would take down one balloon at a time. It’s an amazing story that you can read about over at Kent’s site Couch Balloons. How did Kent share the adventure? With SPOT, of course! Kent’s field team used SPOT to track him during the trip to know where he was, and as an alert device if he needed help. 

Kent’s web programmer used SPOT shared pages to post Kent’s travel on his site. The reaction was terrific. In fact, web visitors quickly reached the shared pages “beta” viewing limit of 500 views per 15 minutes. With some quick work from our developers, we worked with Kent’s programmers to allow for more views. Of course, the whole time Kent’s team had complete access to his account through the SPOT web service. 

For the enterprising folks who are integrating SPOT into their own sites, here are quick instructions on how to do it: How To Insert SPOT Shared Data Document 

Oh, and if you anticipate ending up in the national media like Kent did, let us know. We like to work that out beforehand.

SPOT at Outdoor Retailer

SPOT will be at the Outdoor Retailer 2008 show in Salt Lake City this August. We’ll be both at the Pineview Reservior portion, showing off SPOT in its natural environment — outdoors– and at the main convention center, both in the SPOT booth and hosting the Kayak lounge. Hard to believe that it was only last year that we announced SPOT at Outdoor Retailer 2007. This year we will be holding a joint press conference with our friends at Primal Quest presented by SPOT adventure race to share our success at the 2008 race, and possibly make some great announcements about Primal Quest 2009. 

Date: Friday, August 8, 2008 3:00 pm 

Place: Paddle Lounge, Salt Palace, Salt Lake City, Utah, Outdoor Retailer Summer Show  

 

SPOT Save story in Asheville Citizen Times.

http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200880710124

Interesting article in the Citizen Times today about another SPOT save. Good news, sounds like the hiker will be well. The article raises a question about people using distress alerting devices with a “panic-button” mentality and calling out public safety resources unnecessarily, this seems very unlikely with the SPOT satellite messenger. 

Here’s the quote we offered the author that didn’t make it into the article: ”SPOT offers a variety of messaging functions depending on the need of the subscriber. The Help message enables SPOT users to ask for non-emergency assistance and eliminates the potential of notifying emergency rescue in a panic, said Derek Moore, Public Relations for SPOT LLC.  “People should always be educated and prepared when spending time in the outdoors. The SPOT 9-1-1 function offers a back-up when there is an unexpected emergency situation, and as we all know, things happen.”   

Seems to us like the options with SPOT make it much less likely to cause a “panic-button” mentality than a Personal Locator Beacon which has only one option. 

Here’s an excerpt from the article: 

“The locator device that alerted rescuers to a lost hiker this week in the Shining Rock Wilderness Area is gaining in popularity among outdoors enthusiasts as one way to call for help in an emergency.

But rescue workers and wilderness survival experts also say the rise of affordable trackers using satellites could create a panic-button mentality that might lead to needless search operations.

Haywood County rescue officials wouldn’t say the exact nature of the 23-year-old hiker’s emergency, and he could not be reached Thursday.”

SPOT at EAA Airventure

SPOT is a major sponsor of the EAA Airventure show in Oshkosh, Wisconson for 2008, and we will be on site with incredible offers for EAA members. Come by the booth and check out how SPOT can help out pilots. 

SPOT is the device the AOPA called “an a-ha! moment for general aviation.” SPOT lets you live your life and tell others exactly where you are and how you’re doing – in real time. Because SPOT uses satellites, it works in places cell phones never will. 

Now you can let your spouse know you’re OK, ask for help from friends and family, or track your flightpath and show it to others back at home in real time, all while you’re in the air. In trouble? Hold the 9-1-1 button to alert emergency responders around the world for critical assistance. Of course, SPOT is just as useful when you land. 

Find out more at http://www.findmespot.com