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'There is no denying the sense of cell'
By Robert Speik
This article was Commissioned by The Mountaineers, (a Club of 10,500 people, "formed to enrich the community of the Pacific North West") and Published on the front page of their June 2009 issue of their monthly magazine.

For 10 days in December 2006, the world’s media focused on the plight of three experienced mountain climbers missing in a heavy snowstorm near the summit of Mt. Hood. Two had died in a probable catastrophic fall. Stranded in a snow cave, a hypothermic Kelly James called his home in Texas using his digital cell phone to say goodbye, triggering the massive failed rescue effort. He did not call 911 for rescue.

In November 2006, James Kim, his wife and their two small children had become stranded on a southern Oregon byway while driving toward home in San Francisco. The media headlined the search efforts as many days passed. Cell phone engineers, volunteering their un-sought expertise, offered Searchers the general location of the Kim’s car, based on pings from a single tower to their listening digital cell phone. Shortly thereafter, Kim's wife and children were rescued and James was found the following day. James Kim had died of hypothermia one day before his family’s rescue while on an heroic quest to save his family.

In September 2007, more than a week after failing to return home from work, Maple Valley resident Tanya Rider was found quickly after Washington authorities finally asked her cell phone provider for the coordinates of her listening digital cell phone. She was still alive but dehydrated and injured, hanging in her seat belt in her car at the bottom of a steep ravine in the Seattle suburb.

The cited incidents serve to remind backcountry travelers that cell phones can communicate from urban-facing slopes or summits. They can also help locate an injured stranded traveler.

Currently, the case is been made for the inclusion of the common digital cell phone as Essential backcountry safety gear because of such incidents as those in Oregon and Maple Valley. In the mountaineering world, the controversy over possible excessive use of cell phones to trigger expensive search and rescue missions still simmers. But the fact is that climbing rescues actually comprise a minor percentage of rescue responses. According to Oregon State records, climbing accounts for just 3.4 percent of all rescues—slightly higher than mushroom harvesting—while hiking accounts for 13.8 percent. Vehicles, including ATVs and snowmobiles, top the list at 20.5 percent.

The basic responsibilities of backcountry travelers include the designation of a Responsible Person to call 911 if the traveler does not return by a specific time. Searchers will want to know the details of the car, the planned trailhead, the traveler’s proposed route or routes from the trailhead, and when other participants are involved, their preparations and experience as well. Searchers will ask for all of their cell phone numbers.

Backcountry rescue is not initiated until a request is made through a call to 911. When backcountry travelers become stranded due to illness or injury, or if they become lost and are forced to stay overnight, it may be better to call for help at that time, rather than waiting for the designated person to call 911 hours or days later.

This is what makes a cell phone most valuable. The common digital phone allows a stranded backcountry traveler to provide Rescuers with their specific coordinates using the traveler’s topo map and GPS receiver, and the details of their problem, their condition, their plans and more. This clearly assists the search and rescue effort.

Personally, I have an “emergency cell phone plan.” My regular three ounce digital cell phone was “free” and my simple service costs just $10 per month, including some free minutes and just pennies for possible additional minutes. I have up-loaded the cell numbers of my responsible person, my family, friends and companions and the local land managers.

Most of my companions have common digital cell phones and they carry them shut off in their packs to provide back-up cell phone battery power. We may check the connection quality from time to time as we hike so that we have a sense of where we can connect to one or more cell towers.

Cell phone buyers should note that few units contain an actual internal GPS radio signal receiver that tracks Department of Defense satellites. Even expensive cell phone navigation plans that give you turn-by-turn highway directions use cell tower “triangulation” and not GPS generated coordinates, according to my provider, Verizon. FCC E911 Requirements for Providing Mobile Phone Geographic Locations.

A "smart phone" does not replace the map, compass and GPS together. The smart phone map is planimetric, socialized and only detailed enough for a motor home. There is no accurate compass. There is no real GPS function. Sales advisors seldom hike and have never seen a USGS Quad topo map, a declination adjusted base plate compass or a hand held GPS receiver -- they "know not that they know not".

Other communication options:
A $35 pair of walkie-talkie (FRS) radios may help keep your group together and may help contact nearby searchers, but someone within range of a few miles must be listening on your Channel, selected from several options. Not a good option.

My wife and I are FCC licensed General class amateur radio operators. My handheld amateur radio is pretty heavy and it eats special batteries. There are newer options.

I have a friend who rents an expensive satellite phone for his really big trips.

A personal locator beacon (PLB) only calls to initiate an actual rescue and at $600 and up, it is costly. It depends on the dedicated international rescue COSPAS-SARSAT nine satellite system to send out a distress signal but unlike other options, it cannot be lawfully field tested.

In the absence of known cell tower coverage, I use the technology of the new “SPOT Personal Satellite Messenger” (now SPOT-2) -costing about $149 plus a $100 annual unlimited satellite phone connection charge. Three replaceable Lithium AA batteries from any store, power this new device. SPOT satellite communications can be tested unlimited times in all your usual personal travel locations, sending pre-written, changeable and trip specific email messages with your lat-lon coordinates pin pointed on an attached adjustable Google map, to family and to friends. If these free satellite/email messages get through, so would an emergency request for help to 911/SAR.

Your personal cell phone call to 911, coupled with USGS topo map, declination adjusted baseplate compass, a basic GPS and some simple skills, can provide rescuers with your exact geographic coordinates and your personal description of the problem, the current conditions, your plan of action and much more. Your cell phone could take the “search” out of search and rescue.

Bottom line: Add your common digital cell phone to your Essential Systems when traveling or climbing in the backcountry.
Copyright©, 2009-2012 by Robert Speik. All Rights Reserved.

Robert Speik writes for his website, www.TraditionalMountaineering.org, and provides instruction in mountaineering. He has written many Reports for the annual journal, “Accidents in North American Mountaineering.”

The rest of the story

Deschutes County Sheriffs Search and Rescue Volunteer Coordinator Al Hornish, a 12 year veteran of DCSAR, stated the following in an interview published on January 26, 2012 in the Bend Oregon Source Weekly: "We have grown a lot over the past decade. The nature of missions has changed as well." "There are more Rescues and less Searches, mostly because of the better technology available." Read More. --Robert Speik

FCC E911 Requirements for Providing Mobile Phone Geographic Locations: Read More about the latest facts. --Robert Speik, 2012

FIFTEEN WEEKS
Wednesday, July 7, 2010, or nearly four months since my fall off Mount Temple. After so much time, there is much to dwell on. The negatives: the pain of so many fractures, the sleeplessness, the drugs and the messed up things they do to you. It’s easy to get stuck in the negative; yet some part of me is drawn there by some morbid fascination.

How big am I then? Not very. I made a mistake, a pretty small mistake. Or more honestly, I made a series of pretty small mistakes. I almost died for these transgressions. I would have died if it had not been for a cell phone and the chain of events it was able to put into motion. (I’ve owned a cell phone for barely six years.) I might not have died that very day, March 25, 2010, but from where we were, we were a long, long way from the medical care my injuries demanded: a trained trauma surgeon in an Emergency Room. Perhaps I would have lasted one night. Maybe not. It changes my perspective about what a day means. Carpe diem no longer seems some frat-boy cry to party. Today, means everything. --Steve House
http://www.stevehouse.net/Site/Training_Blog/Entries/2010/7/7_Fifteen_Weeks.html

Here are some Basic suggestions for all backcountry travelers

1. Practice the Four Basic Responsibilities of the Backcountry Traveler. They work!  Basic Responsibilities

2. Carry the new Ten Essential Systems, sized for the forecast weather and the adventure in a light day pack. This includes a map, compass and GPS and the skills to use them. In the winter, this includes enough extra insulation and waterproof clothing to keep you dry and warm if you become stranded. In snow, you must have a shovel and insulating pad and the skills to make a shelter in the snow to avoid hypothermia and frost bite damage. It works!  Essential Systems