When to set off a PLB?

[AuxBatOn]

Personally, I'll activate it as soon as I am under a good parachute with altitude to spare. In a GA aircraft, I'd activate it before landing, time permitting.

[Nark]

Are you prepared to reveal when they tell you you should activate it?

...I'm not going to talk about what and how we use ours ( South of the border bubba's)...
But I'd imagine when we want to be picked up!

[CID]

It isn't that simple.

Firstly ELTs and PLBs are designed to operate while stationary, the Doppler detection won't work while they're in motion.

Secondly, in an airplane you want to say "I don't need help this instant at my present position but I might, when I come to rest, in a few minutes and some distance from where I am now. Unfortunately at the time I may need help I may be unable to activate my PLB". PLB's can't send this message.

That's why I say that PLBs aren't designed for aviation use, so any plan about when to activate one is improvising outside the design parameters of the device.

That this is the case is obvious because the OP needed to ask the question. If PLB's were a good fit for flying he wouldn't have needed to ask when to activate one.

So is it PLBs or PLB's? Do the PLBs own something? Idiot.

[CID]

I think you are engaging in some wishful thinking that the system will perform how you'd like the system to perform. Not all PLB's have GPS, when activated inside an aircraft they may or may not receive a GPS signal, and may not download ephemeris data and perform a cold start for some minutes after activation.

The PLB is designed and engineered to be activated when stationary, upright and with a clear view of the sky. Anything other mode of operation, for better or worse, is improvising.

Anything other mode of operation, for better or worse, is improvising.

Idiot.

[Rescue901]

Set your PLB off right away!

I'm a cormorant pilot and our mission is search and rescue. If you go down and only have a 121.5 elt, it takes quite awhile to get the rescue going since that freq is no longer monitored by the SARSAT satellite. A search of airports, calling towers, etc, plus all this will only happen an hour after your flight plan is overdue. So these are some of the reasons that the rescue takes time to launch. It's recommended that you have a 406 elt or PLB so SARSAT can get a fix on your location this allows rescuers to respond immediately, without all the phone calls and sending the cops to the airport to check for your aircraft. Most PLBs send out a 406 signal which will get picked up by the satellite and give us your hex code location. SARSAT can detect movement of the signal with each pass of the satellite and this information is feed to JRCC and thus passed on to the rescue aircraft. Both the conventional elt and 406 are easy to home, but the 406 elt or PLB are the best bet for a speedy rescue.

[photofly]

Do you think we should activate an aircraft-mounted ELT significantly before an emergency landing (like as soon as it becomes clear one is inevitable)?

[AuxBatOn]

This question is the same as "Should I broadcast that I have an emergency as soon as it becomes clear I have one".

Yes. The sooner, the better. When you are airborne, chances are you ELT is not damaged and will be functioning. Not always the case once the airplanes hits the dirt.

[photofly]

It's curious that "activate ELT" isn't part of the forced approach protocol that I learned. Transponder 7700, declare an emergency - sure - but not ELT. I wonder if that should change.

[AuxBatOn]

Forced approach doesn't mean crash. If you are going to crash, activate the darn thing.

[photofly]

I'll rephrase the question. My single engine Cessna loses power. It's obvious that I'm going to be landing in a field, of which there are a selection. There's no reason to think the landing won't be as smooth as the field allows, but there are always rocks, divits, mudspots and other unseeable reasons why an aircraft can flip, and I could get hurt. Should I fire off the ELT?

[AuxBatOn]

What's the harm if you do?

[Rookie50]

I'll rephrase the question. My single engine Cessna loses power. It's obvious that I'm going to be landing in a field, of which there are a selection. There's no reason to think the landing won't be as smooth as the field allows, but there are always rocks, divits, mudspots and other unseeable reasons why an aircraft can flip, and I could get hurt. Should I fire off the ELT?

I would and I brief my passengers to do so if it appears we would land anywhere but an airport.

[photofly]

What's the harm if you do?

I think, on reflection, that's exactly the right question.

[AuxBatOn]

Then answer it.

[7ECA]

What's the harm if you do?

I think, on reflection, that's exactly the right question.

I'd say there is no harm in doing so. Forced landing, and everything ends up being alright - get out, and call up the local ATC unit and let them know that you activated your ELT due to an emergency, but everything is alright.

On the other hand, things go poorly, and you end up injured or the aircraft is significantly damaged, or a combination thereof, having the ELT already going is a good thing. There is no guarantee that your ELT will activate when you need it to, so why not flip the switch when you've got the chance.

[ahramin]

Activating the ELT is definitely part of my engine failure/forced approach procedure.

[Posthumane]

Thinking back, I'm pretty sure that activating the ELT was part of the forced approach procedure, as part of either the "Communicate" or "Secure aircraft" steps in the procedure. I think that's one of the main reasons to have a remote installed in the cockpit within reach of the crew. While I don't fly with a PLB, I do have a SPOT tracker and provide a link to the tracking page when I file my flight plan. If I had an engine failure it would make sense to me to activate the 911 feature on it when I knew I was going down. If I land safely and am within cell-phone coverage I can simply make a call to cancel it, and if I'm not within cell phone coverage I'll just have to explain the activation when it wasn't strictly necessary. That being said, I never had a SPOT tracker activation included while I was training forced approaches so the chance of me forgetting to do it are high. I'll have to make a point to include that in the future.

[AirFrame]

Activating an ELT was never part of my training for a forced approach, but I learned to fly before 406MHz ELTs were invented and remote activation for 121.5MHz ELTs was not common. We were told to locate the ELT and ensure it was activated... after the crash... Assuming we could move and could get to it in the wreckage.

I now fly with a SPOT, which I definitely would activate as soon as I believed the situation would require a forced approach anywhere ATC couldn't see me. Squawk 7700, activate SPOT, and fly the plane until it stops moving. The link to my SPOT track is in my flight plan file as well.

I haven't updated to a 406MHz ELT yet, i'm still holding the faint hope that either the cost will continue to drop before they are mandated, or superior technology will render the 406MHz ELTs obsolete before they are mandated. Personally I think the SPOT is pretty darn close to doing that already, and it or similar technology with minor modifications could easily be a better option.