Wolf Wilds › Signals and Rescue

Photo Lucasbosch, CC BY-SA 3.0

Radios and beacons

What actually reaches somebody when the phone shows no bars.

What you need

How

  1. Register the beacon before the trip. An unregistered signal still gets answered, but nobody knows who you are or what you were doing.
  2. Carry it on your body, not in the pack. If the boat rolls or the pack goes over the bank, it goes with the pack.
  3. Send a check in message from camp each night. A string of positions gives searchers a line to follow.
  4. If you set it off, leave it on, get it into open sky, and stay put. Moving after a fix is how people get missed.
  5. On the water, call on channel sixteen, say mayday three times, then your name, your position and what is wrong.

Watch for

Danger
  • A beacon under a tarp, in a pack, or against wet rock may never get out.
  • Batteries and subscriptions expire quietly. Check both before every season.
  • Cell coverage on a map is not coverage in a valley.
  • A text that says you are fine is worth nothing if the position is stale.

Notes

A trip plan left with somebody at home is still the cheapest beacon there is. The electronics only shorten the search that plan starts.

radiobeaconsatellite

Updated 2026-09-11

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