Reality

Back to the plane with J. Peterson, that’s my professor. “Just call me JP.” We bring in the survival gear, the carry-on bags and the AC tool kit. I can’t drain the engine oil. I don’t have anything to drain it into. I bring the engine blanket as well. I see no way for a restart. The master is off and the ELT is transmitting. Inside the shed, the ceiling is low. There is a dirt floor. We pry the cap off one drum of what smells and feels like diesel fuel. Having mastered the technique with ax and screwdriver, we check all the barrels. All are the same. At least we have fuel if we can rig a stove. “God it is cold.” There are three sections of stovepipe and parts of an old drum. It looks like it was converted to a wood stove at one time. There was a crude door and welded on legs but no wood that we could find. There were a couple of two by fours in the corner, not much else, a crow bar and a shovel. We needed to do something soon; Charlie was starting to complain of cold feet.

Fortunately they had followed the advise about arctic gloves and parkas but Charlie’s shoes were on the light side. I wrapped him in the engine blanket while what’s his name and I tried to rig the stove. There was a small square board nailed onto the underside of the roof where a stovepipe had once been. We pried it off but the stovepipe was not long enough. There were sections missing. The question was how to start a fire with the diesel fuel and not smoke ourselves out of there. Just getting the stuff to burn in this temperature was a challenge. The oil had a semi gelatinous feel. It did not want to flow.

My pack had a small Primus stove, which we started. There was plenty of AV-gas in the plane. We put the Primus stove in the oven with an empty oilcan on top. I pried the top off the can and punched a small hole in the bottom. The Primus stove I hoped would get hot enough to work as a “chuf-chuf” stove. We propped one of the Fuel drums over the stove, punching a hole in the bottom and punching a corresponding hole in the top of the stove so that the oil would drip onto the hot oilcan. The diesel fuel would not flow, however. It was too cold. J. P. had a big propane lighter which did barely work and his effort to heat the oil by holding the lighter under the hole was met by oil dripping on his glove. He finally mastered the technique and oil dripped on the now fairly hot can. Nothing happened. Out of frustration, or maybe desperation I splashed some AV-gas into the hot oilcan and whoof we had ignition. It was a delicate balance. The cold oil had to be persuaded to drip in a regular flow to keep the flame going. The hot can heated the fuel oil enough that it would burn. Too much or too little and we would be out of business. I hoped the hot oilcan could maintain combustion without the Primus underneath. We had enough AV-gas to keep up it going, but refueling the Primus stove would stop the process. Fortunately, the drip drip and chuff chuff burning of diesel fuel was self-sustaining and I could remove the Primus stove. The heat from the stove eventually heated the drum of fuel oil above, so the drip from the barrel was sustained as well.

The stovepipe was another matter. With only three sections, the pipe did not reach the roof. The smoke hung at about chest level and we had to sit to breath. The hole in the roof did vent the fumes but we had to prop the door open just to breath It was not at all warm on the ground. The floor was an ancient mix of oil and dirt.

All 121.5 MHz EPIRBs, often referred to as Category B (or “Mini B's) are manual activation units. Although these units do work with the low-earth orbiting satellite system, they do not work as well as 406 MHz beacons, and they cannot be detected by the geo-stationary satellites that provide instantaneous alerting for 85% of the globe. Furthermore, 121.5 MHz beacons are a large source of wasted effort by SAR forces. Most 406 MHz false alerts can be resolved easily with a phone call. In contrast, every 121.5 MHz false alert must be tracked to the source using direction-finding equipment. These reasons (and more) have lead the International COSPAS-SARSAT Program to phase out 121.5 MHz satellite alerting on February 1st, 2009. Thus, if you have a 121.5 MHz EPIRB it will no longer work with the COSPAS-SARSAT Satellites after that date and you will need to make the switch to a 406 MHz EPIRB!

A new type of 406 MHz EPIRB, having an integral GPS navigation receiver, became available in 1998. This EPIRB will send accurate location as well as identification information to rescue authorities immediately upon activation through both geo-stationary (GEO SAR) and polar orbiting satellites. These types of EPIRB are the best you can buy.

406 MHz emergency locating transmitters (ELTs) for aircraft are currently available. 406 MHz personnel locating beacons (PLBs) are available in Alaska and Canada, and will soon be available throughout the U.S.
With the new 406 EPERB and built in GPS, your location can be fixed within a mile.. This technology almost eliminates the need to think about anything else. Just flip the switch and it says, “Come and get me.” The old ELT on 121.5 and 243.0 even with satellite potential cannot identify you, are hard to distinguish from false signals and work only when the satellite is in range of your station and the receiving station as well.

The GPS, combined with a cell phone might work down below, but here for the most part there is no coverage or no compatible coverage. In Alaska, coverage is limited to Anchorage and a few of the larger costal towns. There are a couple of satellite phones, which would work too, but not well at these latitudes. You may need to rely on the aircraft radio or a small handheld aviation frequency transceiver, talking to overlying aircraft. The former may be damaged and the later is low power with questionable battery life. I would like to have a GPS in my pack so that I could give a precise position. If I had the 406 PLB, I would not bother with the hand held VHF.

The EPERB instills complacency with regards to the rest of the survival equipment and procedures. Don’t buy into that view. The very thing that caused you to be where you are may prevent a helicopter from reaching you. It may be weather, or some natural disaster, even some man made disaster. Be prepared for other things to go wrong.