Whoops, didn’t mean to call
June 17th, 2008, 9:12 am · 6 Comments · posted by Dave Philipps
On his third attempt to climb Mt. McKinley, Steve Howe, Rocky Mountain editor for Backpacker magazine, decided to carry a SPOT Satellite Messenger – an Internet tracking beacon that is designed to send SOS messages by email or text message. It was a “just in case” sort of thing. You don’t plan to use it, you hope you don’t need to, but… Then his wife and friendgot an SOS text on their Crackberries. here’s what it said.
Steve Howe is injured or immobilized & cannot proceed, but has no immediate life-threatening condition. Evac please
Latitude:63.0807
Longitude:-151.0691
Nearest Location: Kantishna, United States
There was panic. Three hours of panic. What would they do? They called the park rangers. The rangers radioed up to high camp. Fortunately, before a full rescue was launched they learned Howe’s SPOT was triggered inadvertently. Howe was just fine, he hadn’t even realized the darn thing had gone off. He was a bit embarrassed by the whole thing. I know how he feels. I’ve left my phone in my pocket and accidentally called friends ’cause I sat on it wrong on a bar stool, but when that happens, there isn’t a potential of helicopters showing up (mainly because I don’t have that type of friends)
There’s a blog posting on the whole fiasco Backpacker.com (Click here to read) . Howe’s SPOT is now turned off.
June 17th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
What, I move the blog and no one wants to comment any more?
June 17th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
This blog needs help.
Hit the Alt-Format-Better key on your keyboard and see if you can polish this turd.
June 17th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Ok, I’m in, and maybe don’t have to be Mr. Anonymous anymore (or register). I bet his wife was freakin’ he probably told her all about how cool his new gadget was and then she gets “the call.”
June 17th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
That’s because we got the damn right wing looking on now. That Gazette logo lords over the site like Joe McCarthy’s gavel, ready to strike at the first sign of a tree hugging or an inking of progressive thought.
Just kidding. All hail the gods of money!
June 26th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
[…] a great story, so great that other blogs and publications are linking to it. Lots of them. Which, according to how SPOT handles it, could be either a great opportunity […]
August 6th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
I don’t think we should be hard on the poor beggar that accidently set the SPOT off. This SPOT thingy is only one way and it looks like I’d accidently press a key too if it was in my pack and I leaned on it at a rest stop. My wife would FREAK if she got a distress call so it better be right. There’s no way to “turn it off” if the SPOT call goes out. But it looks like there’s a two-way unit coming out soon with a panic button protector, http://www.solaradata.com.