Privacy in the Woods? 824
Rorschach1 asks: "I work with a local Search and Rescue team, and for some time I've been thinking about the possibility of installing sensors at a few critical trail junctions in the local back country. The sensors would detect passing hikers and report timestamps to an Internet gateway in near real-time. When a hiker goes missing, this information could be very valuable in determining where search efforts should be directed.
However, I've spent enough time on Slashdot to know that whenever you start monitoring or tracking people and their activities, someone's going to get upset. So I'd like to hear from the tinfoil hat brigade - what are your objections to such a system, and how might your concerns be addressed?"
keep it anonymous and private. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think I would have much of an objection to one being in place as long as there is no requirement for a permit to be camping/hiking in the park. If you are able to place a specific hiker in the area to the timestamps then that's too intrusive for me. I get out into the woods to get away from people. I don't want people being able to track me in real time out there. I really don't see a need for it either.
I would have serious reservations unless someone made sure that the statistics are kept private, very, very, very private. Who knows what person would have access to it (not everyone in law enforcement is all that friendly). Say they notice a hiker *alone*? They could go out there and get a good idea of where the person might be headed (or staying). Knowing where the points are for tracking they themselves might be able to bushwhack around the sensors and do things I don't care to mention.
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:3, Insightful)
I like this idea!
no ... (Score:5, Interesting)
hand out some sort of tag to the hikers when they arrive. if the hiker wants it, they can carry it along. when they come within reach of a sensor, the tag gets a session id of sorts.
this way, you can track individual persons about the woods, but have no actual knowlegde of who they are, other then "some person".
when the hikers leave the area, they hand in the tag, which is reset and then given to someone else.
public disclosure in a system, which cannot expose individuals is a good thing
Re:no ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:no ... (Score:4, Insightful)
So some guy grabs one of these beacons and proceeds to get lost in the woods in a storm. He dies of hypothermia before the rescue crews can find him. Now, somehow, it's their fault? And the guy's family rides the legal system to their pot of gold.
That's what's so f*cked up with the US. The guy posting wants to use tech to help find lost people, and in doing so opens him self up to lawsuits. It's a wonder anyone invents anything.
Re:no ... (Score:5, Insightful)
If Joe goes missing, what tag do I look for if I don't know what tag Joe has? Do I wait for everyone else to turn theirs in maybe? I'm not sure if people would be expected to do that..
Doesn't really seem to make sense.
In my mind, as long as it's optional -- TRULY optional -- then there's no problem tracking people. The other thing to be done is to not keep records of the data for extended periods of time. Not sure exactly what that definition would be, but presumably some duration longer than when people get reported missing.
a thought (Score:5, Interesting)
if you have 30 blips on the map, then that's only 30 places to check.
it's a little bit more work, but much less than a full-on search and rescue.
if you really wanted to get advanced, have the tracker contain 2 buttons- "help!" and "I'm ok"
if someone is lost, beep the tracker- if someone responds back with I'm ok, don't investigate it. if they don't respond back or send "help" investigate it.
Re:a thought (Score:5, Funny)
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:5, Informative)
a Personal Locator Beacon (PLB); as they say, it
removes the 'search' part of S&R. There is a
very good FAQ about PLB on this web site:
http://www.equipped.com/plb_legal.htm
--Sylvain
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:But what about the idiots? (Score:4, Informative)
I know this is completely off-topic, but I have to disagree that this sort of behaviour is human nature.
I know for sure that such a system would work fine in Japan (where I currently live). People wouldn't fuck with it, and there would be no vandalism. Therefore it's not human nature, but cultural values that cause this sort of behaviour.
Japan has many examples of public systems that would be impossible in, say, Australia (my home country):
Most trains here have advertisements hanging from the roof in the form of large paper sheets. In Australia they wouldn't last 5 minutes before being torn down or set alight.
Public phones have a phone jack to allow you to plug in a modem - in Australia these would all be filled with chewing gum.
Restaurants deliver food in nice bowls with nice trays, which are meant to be left outside your front door for the restaurant to pick up the next day. In Australia they'd be stolen or vandalised more often than not.
When I was a teenager I indulged in a lot of vandalism and semi-delinquent behaviour, so I'm no stranger to those impulses. But I they're not "human nature".
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:5, Interesting)
Seems to work well enough, I question the need for a high-tech solution. If people want to be dumb, let 'em. Otherwise there is non-intrusive, low-tech, easy to use system already working.
The problem with the proposal is there is no user ibput so you don't know when to start worrying.
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:3, Insightful)
1) The set of people who forget to bring their RFID tags and get lost probably intersects with the set of people who today forget to tell the forest rangers where, and for how long, they are planning on hiking. That's not a flaw in your system, just Murphy's Law.
2) Once people start thinking there's some sort of radio tag capable of linking them back to civilization, they'll start clamouring for cel-phone access.
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:5, Insightful)
So when designing this sort of thing, it's important to think of the damage that can be done when someone less scrupulous than yourself is in charge of it, and try to design the system around that scenario. (This is also a good safeguard to keep yourself from falling into the temptation of misusing it later on.)
So to be fair, hikers MUST be told that they are being watched. (I think there's actually a law about that, but IANAL.) And they must be told where the watchpoints are (not by law, but in the interest of fairness). And the information gathered should not be private, far from it. It should be completely transparent. Surveillence data is an unbalancing of power only when it's data that only one group has. When it's data that everybody has, then it's not so unbalancing. Joe average should be able to find someone's sensor trail on a website just as easily as the ranger sitting in the search-and-rescue booth.
And if you think that would amount to too much information given out, and too much invasion of privacy to have that data in the public, then that's a clue that you're being too invasive.
Basically, if the data you want to collect is data that would be considered an invasion of privacy if it was published to the public, then it's also an invasion of privacy to collect it and keep it to yourself.
Re:keep it anonymous and private. (Score:3, Interesting)
Hmm.
As long as Joe Average can't connect that data to a individual identity, I'm ok with that. (JA: "Hey, look, my neighbor Charlie is out hiking in Yellowstone. He really pissed me off last week; he's hiking all alone, and I know where he was an hour ago or so"....)
The system could still work well for it's intended purpose - "74 hikers in, 73 out. Uh oh. We
dream on (Score:4, Insightful)
Show me a voluntary system paid for by tax dollars. The more elaborate the system, the greater the cost and the more likely it would be forced. After all, unless the rescue team is a volunteer organization, you are already paying for the service.
Every dinky camera system erected so far has been used in exactly the manner the foil hat people said it would be. Once the tool is paid for it will be abused by the state. The only way to prevent the abuse is to realize that the tool does not satisfy the stated goals and to not build it in the first place.
This kind of thing reeks of statism. Taken to it's extreme, you won't be allowed to walk in the woods without permission and careful monitoring. Your enjoyment of the woods takes a back seat to society's costs of your potential injuries. You don't own the woods because the state owns your hide by providing you with all of these nifty services. I already see signs about not being able so spend the night in areas and other mindless restrictions that assume the park belongs to the park service rather than the park service belongs to me.
It's for your own good, they say. Sure it is. Like cameras that give you speeding tickets, keep people from driving in Central London and can be used to track any political opponent are for my own good - too bad they have been proven useless for their stated purpose of crime prevention.
The devil is in the details. A system that would really be useful would also have to be very invasive. Even then the value will be negligible. The world is a large place and people are small in it.
The park rescue officer will complain that narrowing the search lowers his own risk of injury. The other way to lower that risk of injury is to not search at all. How many young men have died on wild goose chases? Does it all add up when you figure out how many people were actually saved?
Wired woods are not for me.
Should be ok (Score:5, Insightful)
Identity (Score:5, Insightful)
How about making the sensors voluntary? (Score:5, Informative)
Plus, make sure to have a good privacy policy, dictating what the info will be used for!
Re:How about making the sensors voluntary? (Score:3, Informative)
Candidate sensor types are through-beam IR, passive IR, and seismic. Retroreflective IR has the disadvantage of requiring a very visible reflector, and can be confused by reflective clothing. Seismic sensors have the advantage of being almost undetectable when they're buried under or beside a trail, and they can probably be calibrated to not trigger on lighter animals.
Power will be ei
Re:How about making the sensors voluntary? (Score:3, Insightful)
Sunlight is also voluntary, as you can sit under a UV lamp. Suggesting that not using a public area is a reasonable alternative for those who don't wish to be tracked is absurd because it fails to address the primary objection that it is madatory.
How about RFID reader stations at intervals along the trail, and RFID tags are available at the ranger station? True, not making it mandatory doesn't help when "stupids" get lost without a tag, but treating
It's a good idea (Score:5, Funny)
-Rylfaeth
Carry on (Score:3, Interesting)
Some like the risk. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Some like the risk. (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't care what appeals to you. If you expect S&R to bail you out of a mess, a little RFID tag is not too much to ask.
Believing that "Darwin doesn't apply to me" is often the first step in proving that it does.
Simpler, quicker, and exists already (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Simpler, quicker, and exists already (Score:3, Funny)
2. Require all missing hikers to carry a cell phone.
3. Spam them with text messages. r u short on wood? msg me!!! c14Iis wrks!!!
4. Profit!
-Adam
... and does not work. (Score:3, Informative)
Then one day they decided to just turn off the analog part. Apparently, this is a part of some big transition where t
Only me (Score:5, Funny)
attn echelon and other busybodies: that was a joke.
No Worries About Privacy (Score:3, Insightful)
To paraphrase an old saying: (Score:4, Funny)
Smash 'em (Score:3, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not for you to decide, sport. (Score:3)
if you do that on land that's not your own, then you're a vandal.
Public property does belong to you and I and to him. We are 'the public' after all. If I see garbage in the woods, I pick it up. If I saw signs nailed to a tree, I would tear them off.
Re:Smash 'em (Score:5, Insightful)
Funny, I was about to demolish your house since it was a blight on the land. Y'know. Just in my personal opinion, which, of course, makes it okay to destroy property.
If you're ripping down private garbage that was put on public land, fine. But if you're ripping down shit that my tax dollars paid to put up on public land, and will pay to repair after you decide that your word is suddenly law, I'd really appreciate it if you could stick your head in the toilet and flush it a few times.
Re:Smash 'em (Score:3)
People get murdered all the time. I don't see what the big deal is if I run them down with my car.
Good one - trying to justify your destruction of public property based on the stupidity and callousness of other people. I guess the thought never crossed you mind that YOU are destroying the property, and therefore all of Iraq is completely irrelevant to this discussion? Or, are you saying that you're destroying property in Iraq? Or, wait - maybe you're saying that the destruction of public property in Iraq s
Please don't. (Score:3, Insightful)
Not the last place... (Score:3, Funny)
Depends what you're detecting... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Depends what you're detecting... (Score:3, Informative)
Different angle on the idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Different angle on the idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
Anonymity. (Score:4, Interesting)
And so in a puff of smoke (Score:5, Funny)
12H>look yro.
You see a small box on the floor.
12H>take yro
The YRO zaps you and you immediately let go of it.
eh... better cut down on my MUD dosage.
Tin Foil Poisoning (Score:3, Insightful)
Give me a break. Its a life saving tool. It would not know who the hiker was so I say screw it. If they don't like it let them go get lost somewhere else..
Since in this case they do have a choice.. Your not forcing them to walk down your monitored trail, they are choosing to do it on there own then forget it.
I would be midly surprised if you had one person go home because they where afraid you might be able to track them when the next snow storm hits and there to stupid to come back.
It could end up being a crutch (Score:3, Insightful)
Make it low-tech (Score:3, Insightful)
This is assuming your campers do what I've had to do every time I've gone to the back country. Is to sign in, give member counts, get fire permits, etc... Inform them to sign in at each box and explain why. They do or they don't.
Somehow this isn't a tin hat problem for me and I'll even show you my card.
-[d]-
Trail Head Log Book (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Trail Head Log Book (Score:4, Insightful)
Some people even leave a trail map on their dash board with the time of departure noted and their intended course highlighted.
These aren't the people this system is conceived to help.
Is It Necessary? (Score:5, Insightful)
Going for a walk in the woods is one of the few escapes from the intrusions of modern society still available.
Leave the control over information disclosure in the hands of the hiker. Let them take a cell phone, leave an itinerary with a friend, start a fire if they're in trouble. Besides, if you really need to find people you can get the police helicopter with IR sensors to comb the woods with your search and rescue team in an emergency.
I know you mean well, but this is where you ought to let people assume special risks and precious responsibilities - Don't take them away so lightly.
Rather, put your efforts into an education program for students. How to enjoy the woods, hike safely, avoid hypothermia, etc. Sponsor some hikes and let them get a feel for how wonderful it is to be in the wilderness away from civilization.
Re:Is It Necessary? (Score:3, Interesting)
I understand what you mean about preserving the woods, and I agree in principle. But we still put in signs, we still mark trails and make sure that they're clear. If there are unobtrusive sensors on pa
Re:Is It Necessary? (Score:3, Insightful)
So instead of a tracking system, law enforcement in the area has to go on full alert every time an inexperienced moron gets himself into trouble in the wild? Hunting for a single person in even just a few dozen square miles is difficult and time consuming.
And generally the type of people that get lost or injured are the type that fa
It is optional (Score:4, Interesting)
Privacy objections to RFID tags involve subliminal usage (shop tags etc.), or inclusion in items that must be carried such as drivers licencse.
BTW, there are allready tracking solutions in use that use GPS in conjuction with satellite comms. Users only need switch on devices when they want. When they do the device periodically sends an SMS like message giving the current coords read from the GPS. Likewise such devices can be used to send an SOS that includes the exact coords.
wildlife cameras (Score:3, Interesting)
I worked for a company that made these (Score:5, Informative)
And, for all of the tin-foil hatters out there, you might be suprised to know that the forestry service already uses such devices. So does border patrol. We have also sold units that have been deployed at Area 51. These are passive infrared detectors, vibrational sensors (some contained within air-droppable cones that burrow into the ground), and magnetic sensors among others.
I can't go into specifics about design, but I would be happy to answer any questions (non-design related) that anyone has.
I worked at this company up until last December, when I quit. However, I might be doing consulting work for them in the future.
Privacy aside, these are already in use in some cases, and no one even realizes it because they are highly covert. Privacy concerns, IMO, do not come into play with devices deployed on government land, especially when no identifying information is given. Its like walking through a door beeper in a store, except that this one counts direction of travel and the presense of movement. Stuff that has more information tagged on, however, gets shaky in the privacy area, I will admit.
Why not use... (Score:4, Funny)
Give each person a loaf before they set out on their hike. Instruct them to sprinkle the bread behind them as they walk. If they have the misfortune to get lost, the trail of bread will show them the way home.
Hyperlink withdraw is my problem.
My input? It's a waste of time. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is less of a tin-foil hat issue and more of your idea being redundant and a waste of money. First off, hikers are already tracked. Before you go on any long distance hike, you should typically sign in at a local ranger station. These are usually where the best drop-off points and parking lots are. Plus, it's just good to be face to face with a ranger before hitting the woods. At least then, they will have a face in memory, just in case you turn up missing.
Anyway, tax dollars are already being spent on tracking hikers through a paper log, there is no benefit to doing it digitally, and considering costs of managing the electronic system, it's pointless and doesn't deserve much attention.
No offense, just an honest thought on the issue. I grow weary of people searching for technical solutions to mundane things that can be done better through arcane methods.
In other words -- "Keep it simple, stupid."
how might your concerns be addressed? (Score:4, Insightful)
Let me carry one or not, as I choose. If I wish to go out in the woods alone and get lost, that's my business.
If I wished to be tracked I'll carry a beacon, simple as that.
Having someone to come after me if I get in trouble is one thing. Having my mommy watch me all the time to make sure I don't get into trouble is another.
KFG
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
The opposite problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The opposite problem (Score:4, Interesting)
I've been on searches where the lost person has a cell phone. More than once the person has reported being lost to someone else and then stayed on the line for a while draining the battery completely - but not giving us any information that would really help us to find him.
Search and Rescue? (Score:3, Interesting)
And if they are looking for volunteers, what are the qualifications? Do you need an amateur radio license? First aid certifications? How much time does it take to be a member of an S&R team -- I presume there are training sessions, meetings, and of course the occasional actual S&R assignment.
I've sometimes thought that I should join an S&R team, because my life is set up so that if I had to suddenly take a day off, I could do so. But I have no idea if an S&R team would even want me.
steveha
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Search and Rescue? (Score:3, Informative)
More often, they're all (or mostly) volunteer, run by the Sherriff's department or maybe the county fire department.
Being in decent physical shape is probably the biggest requirement. My team requires a six-month academy, with two to five days of training a month, before you start doing callouts. An EMT certification might also be required - depends on the team.
You should be prepared to spend at least two full days a mon
You will track more deer than hikers (Score:4, Insightful)
Deer, elk, moose, etc. will frequent those trails more than humans will. (They get out of the way when they hear us coming). You'll get a bunch of traffic on your sensors at dusk and dawn. I don't think you'll have very good data - too much noise.
Falling Hikers (Score:5, Interesting)
No. No no. No. (Score:3, Insightful)
The "safer society" club of America is getting in my way of having a good time.
I do not want you to look out for me, watch over me, make sure I don't smoke in a bar. I do not need you to tell me my kids should wear helmets on bikes, nor do I require your input on just how much protective gear I should wear when I use my weed whacker on the lawn. I certainly do not reuquire you and your supporters forcing my car to have things like a GPS (in case I get lost, yes, I know) or insisting that my cell phone can be found in the middle of the Mojave (for that one in 100 million of us who stumbles headlong into the barren desert, sure).
We, the free thinking and self-aware people of north America are really sick and fucking tired of you looking out for us. We are not your children nor your keep. Please kindly fuck off and take your mother-hen make the world a safer place excuse for butting into my lifestyle back into your own living room where it squarly belongs.
A society without risks is a society who cannot place a tangible value on the rewards afforded to some risk takers.
-- RLJ
ummm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Installing such sensors sounds harmless enough, but even there may be things to watch out for: wildlife impact, liability, pollution, litter laws, fire hazard, etc.
I mean, they are powered devices, right? They can short out? They do contain some heavy metals? They need to be maintained and they need to be removed when they no longer work, etc.
Options (Score:3, Insightful)
However, one person made a good point that this does run counter to why some of us go to the natural areas. I had two places I went to when I grew up. Both of those places represented "God made" areas barely touched by people. Thus, the escape for me was to be somewhere where God was and civilation had virtually no impact.
One of those places was changed to permit public access, which ruined it, because they had to destroy 90% of why we went there in order to make it "safe."
The other place put cameras in the trees, again in the name of safety. This, again, ruined it. I went there to be away from civilization, but cameras just bring civilization to you, just knowing that someone behind some TV can watch.
I had nothing to hide; wasn't a criminal or a fugitive. Heck, these were place I went to since age 7 to enjoy some time in a God created recreation area with rivers, trees, mountains and wildlife that people didn't ruin yet. I simply didn't want civilation to be at a place where I went to enjoy time away from civilation.
Yours is less intrusive, but clearly you are bringing in the presence of technology in the name of safety to a place where people go to get away from technology and other totems of civilization.
Thus, I'd have to consider other options that might be possible, and even more effective at your goal. One option might be to offer beacon devices that are off unless someone turns them on. The person can choose to:
This way, you have the ability to locate a person to an exact location. Yet, the system is truly voluntary, and people even have the option of only turning the beacon on if they actually need it, meaning that for those people, they have increased safety over no beacon, without having to sacrifice any privacy unless they actually have an emergency.
With radio technology dirty cheap, I imagine that such a beacon device can be quite cheap.
Much better idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless you only allow one hiking team in the park at a time, you will have multiple logs/hits of movement from multiple trail monitors, assuming the monitors manage to effectively send a signal each and every time a human (and only a human) passes the monitor.
Once you have all the data logged, how do you know where a hiker party went? Was that them on trail "A" or were they on trail "F"? Are the hikers going to be required to file a hiking plan from which they may not deviate?
So we have: unreliable sensor data and unknown parties with unknown destinations. I don't see where a system such as you proposed would provide any data that an S&R team could use to locate missing people faster.
And there's still the whole "you don't know they're missing/in trouble until they don't show up for a few hours/days and someone else calls you.
A far better method would be to use emergency locator transmitters (ELTs) carried by each party or person in the park, and do it on a voluntary basis. When someone gets need help they would activate the ELT which would be "heard" at a central station and S&R teams would be dispatched to home in on the signal. With the right type of box the holder could even press one of several buttons to tell authorities what type of help they need: lost, medical emergency, fire.
This method has the following advantages:
1. There is little to no delay between a person needing assistance and that assistance being dispatched.
2. The search portion of the S&R is virtually eliminated, with beacons you can home in very quickly
3. No-one has to submit to tracking, but they still can have the security it can provide
4. Costs can be recouped by charging a small fee for the transmitters, or for the loss of them
5. The system is probably less complex than the anonymous tracking and reporting/loging
6. No chance of false alerts from large animals moving through the forest
7. Higher chance of successful rescue when you don't have to wait for the person to go missing before trying to find them
Disadvantages:
1. not everyone will want to take an ELT, so S&R will still need to do it the "old fashioned" way at times
2. Potentially higher initial cost depending on how the ELT signal is tracked an the number of units deployed
Re:Much better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Much better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, there will be false hits, and high traffic will make it hard to spot what you're looking for. But then, if there's heavy traffic on that trail segment, chances are someone's going to find your victim before you even get the call.
Traditionally, we track people by footprints and sign - broken twigs, discarded trash, that sort of thing. It's tedious and hard to do in a heavily travelled area, but it's done all the time. An electronic timestamp serves basically the same purpose as this sort of clue, only more reliably.
Also, you often wind up commiting a lot of people to containment - posting people at trail heads to make sure the victim doesn't walk out unnoticed on their own, for example. This might help reduce the number of people required.
I do not support this idea. (Score:5, Insightful)
When I go deep into the mountains, a large part of the joy I experience comes from the knowledge that my life is in my own hands, and that my judgment and decisions will get me out of (or into) any life and death situation that may arise. Every time I go out, I relish the small idea in the back of my mind, the idea that this might be the time I never come back.
There is a certain exhiliration associated with being completely disconnected from the real world, from our social and technological support structures, fending for yourself.
I do not support this idea because:
- It encourages people who are not physically and mentally ready for wilderness travel to enter the wilderness
- It provides a false sense of security, because the devices may stop functioning at any time, or the devices may not cover a particular area
- It will cause people to take risks they would not take under standard conditions, for example they may ford a stream they would otherwise avoid because they feel they have "backup."
- It will invite technological development to the wilderness, an area specifically set aside for the exclusion of those technologies.
Simply put, the wilderness is, and should remain, a wild, volatile, and dangerous place. While I am all for advances in personal safety in remote regions, I also believe that the tools for personal safety should remain personal, in your own hands. Carry a radio or other beacon to signal with if you get into trouble. Learn the skills of relying on yourself that have been taught and relied upon for hundreds of years. This is the spirit of the wilderness.Both as a Hiker and a former SAR member (Score:3, Insightful)
OTOH, I am not above helping people and donating my time to searching for hapless souls who didn't know better. Dead (wo)men don't tell tales; they also don't learn from their mistakes. Everyone should be free to enjoy the great outdoors, but it should also be known that it's not always a picnic, and part of the attraction of such an activity is getting away from it all - "it all" being civilization and all it's trappings, for better or for worse.
Checkpoints (Score:3, Interesting)
What you describe is a big brother device. It automatically detects all passing hikers so that when the damn fools get themselves lost they can be found again.
So build it a different way. The same technoogy you described could be put together like this:
You install "checkpoints" along the trail.
Hikers optionally rent an RFID wriststrap for a buck or so.
The checkpoint is also a map station, etc.
When they hit the checkpoint, they swipe their wriststrap in front of the checkpoint and it emits a beep to let them know it recorded their passage.
At the end of the day, your system sends an email to the hikers to give them a record of when they reached each checkpoint. He/she can race against himself in order to best his previous time.
And as a happenstance side-benefit, if the damn fools get themselves lost, you know which checkpoint they reached last.
Some folks won't want a record of their passage and won't rent a wrist strap. If they get lost, you'll have more trouble finding them and they may suffer avoidable injury or even death. But you know what? That's OK too.
I can see it coming (Score:5, Funny)
Gee, the forests seem so inconvenient and intimidating. I think you've stumbled onto something.
Just print numbers on cards (Score:5, Interesting)
When the card gets read the system just gets a number and location. If the hiker gets lost, the people who have the lost hiker's number can identify which one they're looking for.
If people steal the cards, who cares. It's just a bar code with a long sequence of numbers and letters. The manufacturing costs should be negligable and just lumped in with cost of operations.
You could also charge hikers for the card which they can keep indefinitly. They never have to give personal information to get the card because it doesn't matter. They just need to make sure an emergency contact knows the number. And that the emergency contact isn't someone who's going to be lost with them.
Ben
Re:Just... (Score:5, Funny)
Just give everybody an active radio beacon. Divide the landscape in large "cells" and put a few receivers in each of them. Perhaps we could build a phone in those devices.
The thing is (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure I might get killed but then, I knew that when I was going in there...
Re:The thing is (Score:4, Funny)
Then train the bears to report hiker sights over the radio. The hikers will be none the wiser...
Re:Just... (Score:5, Insightful)
so long as people are not forced to use them, and so long as in using them you are not required to give out your identity, it would be a great idea. if a person could check one out for a $20 deposit and get the cash back when they return it to the rental place, this could save many lives and even many man-hours of searching.
What about animals? (Score:5, Insightful)
What if an animal were to cross a beam? Or if a transmitter fell down, or stopped reporting? You'd still be searching all over the place to try to find the missing person.
I think the better approach would be, as some users have suggested, voluntary RFID tags, or maybe "help" buttons installed in highly visible and easily accessible locations.
Re:Pointless sensors (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't hike alone..... (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess if the person you are with also gets seriously injured, the man upstairs is sending you a message.
Re:Tron Woods (Score:4, Insightful)
"What are you doing?"
"I'm scaring away the elephants."
"But there are no elephants here!"
"See? It's working!"
what about the children? (Score:5, Insightful)
If it's
1) voluntary
2) works
then fine. I'd wonder how you'd power and maintain electronics in areas I know where it can be 110 in the sun or -50F in winter.
It might be something as simple as giving hikers (for a $10 deposit) an iButton that they touch to a box. It records the number and time and that's all. No invasion. Now, if the bottom camp knows that $THIS 64bit number is associated with that party, then they know that they passed and tagged this box. And it's all voluntary.
My experience is that you'd have better luck(?) or results(?) by simply making sure hikers have a MAP and a COMPASS.
A cellphone and a GPS is nice, but too many search and rescues are for the stupid. "My, um, GPSs batteries ran out" or better:
idiot: "I'm precisely HERE."
forest servce: "And do you know where the trail is from THERE?"
idiot: "Um, I (don't have|can't read) a map."
On the plus side, at least some states are charging idiots. If you don't have basics, and need to get your ass rescued, you're liable for 10s of thousands of dollars of rescue. (ever fly a helicopter at night in the rain/snow to find someone in shorts, without a map who's calling on the cell phone? It happens.)
In short, technology will not solve the problem where the basics are missing. I say: Let them evolve.
Re:what about the children? (Score:3, Insightful)
Amen. This would be just like trigger guards and motorcycle helmets. Let 'em die. Nature likes to skim her own gene pool.
Re:what about the children? (Score:3, Insightful)
If the police could shoot the badly injured non-helmet wearers, rather than having them use, in the first 48 hrs, $100,000 of health care, then fine.
If guns without trigger guards blew up the person HOLDING It, then fine.
So sure, we'll go rescue the folks who went out with the aforementioned $idiot. But $idiot has to hike out on his own.
Re:Tron Woods (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a matter of examining both sides, instead of just saying something that feels good. This is one of the reasons we get so many overburdening, overlapping laws, because it feels good to pass them rather than to really take some time to examine what the real cause of something is. Perhaps, on examination, such a system would prove to be better because on balance it would save lives. But to simply decide that it would, and that the saving of a single life would justify deployment of an entire system, is ducking the question.
Re:Tron Woods (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly. Where I lived they passed a new law for new drivers. For a while we've had graduated licencing. For a year and a half you are a "new driver" and have a zero alcohol tolerance level, but other than that all was good. Now they have upped it to longer (2 or 3 years) with the additional restriction that you can only have ONE passenger in the vehicle. The reasoning: There was an accident one year that involved a bunch of teens being loud in a car. Therefore, a law preventing passengers "will save approximatly 4 lives a year. If it saves even one life, it is worth it."
If you want laws that save lots of lives, everybody should wear a GPS belt 24/7, and there should be cameras on every street corner, and in every room of every store, office, and home, and all of their recordings will be tied together with this GPS database. If a camera sees somebody that isn't on the GPS system, the police can be dispatched immediatly. If even one serial killer is caught because of the video cameras and the GPS tracking, it will be worth it, right? No more kidnappings, right?
*groan* (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Tron Woods (Score:4, Insightful)
I guess some people, many people, apparently think yes.
In evaluating such systems, you also have to figure in the bad consequences of the system. Like what about cops abusing the system such as by rigging the system to frame somebody?
It's happening already, in a way, with the red light cameras. Alot of people who don't do the violations are likely paying when they don't have to. I did, figuring if you spent the time in court you'd have to divulge who did drive and they'd go after that person, which in my case would've meant that I paid anyway. Fortunately, that's not the case, but you do have to go to court and contest it - maybe not worth it for some people even with the points if there are any.
With your teenager driving law, what about if a teenager has to walk because he can't ride with a friend due to the passenger law and he ends up getting hit? Something like that's bound to happen sooner or later. (I'm from D.C. and it still sticks in my mind about that guy who visited for some reason and was hit on the street - he lost an arm because of it.)
So, on the one side, you have 4 deaths due to loud music. Assuming these are the only deaths due to more than one passenger being in the car (might not be the case), you'd have to amortise the 4 deaths over the total time cars have been driven by teens in your city - likely a very low rate of death per year (let's say 60 years of driving, 4 deaths = 0.067 deaths per year due to overcrowding).
On the other side goes any injuries resulting from kids having to walk (hopefully very low, but as the recent accident in D.C. shows, it happens), plus all the lost time, missed appointments (kids will be late, especially if they have to walk), and simple loss of the ability for kids to do things if they don't have rides.
Not saying your teenager laws are wrong, but the city's characterization that it saves 4 lives per year with no mentioned downside doesn't tell the whole truth.
Not the same thing, but reminds me of what happened locally due to 911. Lots of metro riders walk into the Pentagon City mall through the parking garage entrance. After 911, they had security there to prevent this for a week or so (why I don't know - driving in was ok, walking not. What, they thought walkers could conceal bombs?). The thing was, with the construction at the time, the only way to walk around was to walk a few hundered feet facing ongoing rush hour traffic with no shoulder space. I almost wished an accident happened so that the mall would get sued - would've served them right.
Re:Cellophane reality (was Re:Tron Woods) (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, every time I go out in the woods, I go out far enough where cell phones don't work. I can't imagine getting lost in the woods where your phone still works. That means you're within a few miles of the nearest tower, which must be near a road. They only put up cell towers where they'll be used, and people sure as hell don't go far from their cars. Humans are very lazy animals.
Don't believe me? When's the last time you were more than a few hundred feet away from your car? When's the last time you walked 10 miles?
People get lost too easily. Hell, they'd get lost on a straight road between point A and point B.. Survival of the fittest, I say. If you don't come back alive, then maybe you shouldn't. It's not a tragic loss, it's population control.
(ya, ya, cold and heartless.)
Re:Cellophane reality (was Re:Tron Woods) (Score:4, Interesting)
Nick - Butte County, CA Search & Rescue
Sarcasm. (Score:3, Insightful)
Why do you attempt to make fun of people who have serious concerns about their privacy?
Come on? It's called sarcasm! If he gave a rats ass about privacy - and therefore people who have serious concerns about their privacy - he wouldn't have submitted this would he? So he's entitled, IMO. :-)
For the record, I'm concerned about my privacy, but I still found the "tinfoil hat brigade" pretty funny.
zLighten up! (Score:5, Funny)
Why do you attempt to make fun of people who have serious concerns about their privacy?
Uhm, if you expect to be taken seriously while wearing a tinfoil hat I'm afraid I've got some bad news for you...
The tinfoil hat looks good on you (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:as long as no logs are kept (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Infrared from the sky (Score:3, Insightful)
Still, I'll happily take a FLIR-equipped aircraft if one is available. But it's hardly a silver bullet for SAR.
Re:but why? (Score:3, Interesting)
Chances are you're only going to be looking over the past 24 hours or so of events, and I don't think wildlife is going to be a significant factor.
As for the amount of woods, I'm really only concerned with a few trail segments. For example, there's a trail that forks at one point a