Personal Locator GPS Tracking Beacon

Please note that it is important you register your Beacon products. You will find more information on how to do this at the bottom of this page.

What are emergency Beacons?

Emergency Locator Beacons are tracking transmitters that operate as part of the Cospas-Sarsat satellite system. When activated, the beacons send out a distress signal that allows the beacon to be located by the satellite system and search and rescue aircraft to locate the people, boats and aircraft needing rescue. They are a component of the Global Maritime Distress Safety System (GMDSS). The basic purpose of the emergency beacons is to get people rescued within the "golden day" when the majority of survivors can still be saved. For over twenty years, these systems enabled the rescue of 14,700 people. As of today, there are more than 82,000 registered beacons, and over 500,000 of the older unregistered type.

There are two types of Beacons:

• Manually activated
• Automatically activated

In the U.S., offshore beacons are investigated and victims rescued by the Coast Guard. On-shore beacons are investigated by local search and rescue services in Alaska. The Air Force Rescue Coordination Center is charged with land-based emergency signals, usually dispatching volunteer members from The United States Air Force Auxiliary Civil Air Patrol.

How do Beacons work?

A beacon is activated by a crash, a sinking, or manually by survivors. The beacon's transmission is picked up by one or more satellites. The satellite transmits the beacon's signal to its ground control station. The satellite's ground station processes the signals and forwards the data, including approximate location, to a national authority. The national authority forwards the data to a rescuing authority. The rescuing authority uses its own receiving equipment to locate the beacon and makes the rescue or recovery. Once the satellite data is in, it takes less than a minute to forward the data to any signatory nation.

The most modern 406 MHz beacons with GPS locate a beacon with a precision of 100 meters, anywhere in the world, and send a serial number so the government authority can look up phone numbers to notify next-of-kin in four minutes, with rescue commencing shortly afterward. The GPS system permits stationary, wide-view geosynchronous communications satellites to enhance the doppler position received by low Earth orbit satellites.

Why Register my beacon?

It's mandatory and could help save your life.

Here is why you need to complete the beacon registration:

• It's FREE and you can update it as many times as you wish.
• The information is only used for search and rescue purposes or beacon false alarms. Confirmation email/mail will be sent to verify your registration.
• In the event that your beacon is activated the information you provide will be appended to the distress message transmitted. This information is critical for SAR forces to locate you in a timely manner and could possibly save your life.
• Its gives search and rescue your contacts information, so that your friends and family can provide valuable information about you in an emergency.
• If your beacon was to falsely activate, search and rescue can contact you to verify if it is an emergency or not.
• Its fast. Register online at: www.beaconregistration.noaa.gov/ or for Canada at: http://beacons.nss.gc.ca/main/Owners.asp
• Its the law.

Be responsible, it only take 10 minutes to register, but it could be the most important 10 minutes of your life if you ever do need to activate your beacon.