AFRCC bypasses CAP

[RiverAux]

From the December 2006 Maine Wing Newsletter:

The tasking came at 0400L today from AFRCC to locate an EPIRB
broadcasting a 406 signal, however, since it was "unregistered", no one
could contact the owner. A UDF team of Maj Knightly and Lt Col Lobo of Bangor drove to Orrington to begin the search and arrived on station at approximately the same time the signal went Neg 2. As a result the expert ground team listened without success with the Tracker but soon the EPIRB went Neg 3 to close the mission.

The frustration with this mission is that the USCG had in fact tracked it to
a specific location on land last evening, however, AFRCC first contacted
the local law enforcement authorities to assist in finding the owner since
they had a fairly good address. Overnight they were unsuccessful in turning
up the owner after knocking on several doors and finally gave up.
AFRCC then contacted MEWG and my suspicion is that the owner may
have turned it off having been tipped by the commotion.

Well, if the AFRCC is going to go stragiht to LE for such 406 missions we might as well pack it up. 

[fyrfitrmedic]

From the December 2006 Maine Wing Newsletter:

The tasking came at 0400L today from AFRCC to locate an EPIRB
broadcasting a 406 signal, however, since it was "unregistered", no one
could contact the owner. A UDF team of Maj Knightly and Lt Col Lobo of Bangor drove to Orrington to begin the search and arrived on station at approximately the same time the signal went Neg 2. As a result the expert ground team listened without success with the Tracker but soon the EPIRB went Neg 3 to close the mission.

The frustration with this mission is that the USCG had in fact tracked it to
a specific location on land last evening, however, AFRCC first contacted
the local law enforcement authorities to assist in finding the owner since
they had a fairly good address. Overnight they were unsuccessful in turning
up the owner after knocking on several doors and finally gave up.
AFRCC then contacted MEWG and my suspicion is that the owner may
have turned it off having been tipped by the commotion.

Well, if the AFRCC is going to go stragiht to LE for such 406 missions we might as well pack it up. 

The question is: Did they actually bypass CAP?

It all depends on what AFRCC has listed for the state of Maine.

[SJFedor]

It depends on the situation.

If AFRCC plugs in the coordinates of the 406 EPIRB into google earth or something, and sees it in some urban type area, looking like it's in some dude's garage, I would think it's a bit easier (and safer) for them to call up the local PD and give them the coordinates, and have an officer nearby stop by and ask the guy to turn it off. PD Officers tend to have a little more authoritative apperance then a couple of CAP officers at 2 in the morning.

Not to mention, probably a better response time then trying to wrangle up a GT.

[ZigZag911]

In the mid 70s urban & suburban sprawl became so prevalent that, in numerous wings, there was talk of the aviation related SAR missions going away.

Then the 80s came, ELTs & SARSAT.

CAP keeps adapting (along with other organizations that have a long history) to meet the challenges 7 needs of the times.

[RiverAux]

Obviously AFRCC has to work through the state and if the state wants to use LE, thats fine, but the article implied that this was the AFRCC's choice "because they had a good address". 

If AFRCC plugs in the coordinates of the 406 EPIRB into google earth or something, and sees it in some urban type area, looking like it's in some dude's garage, I would think it's a bit easier (and safer) for them to call up the local PD and give them the coordinates, and have an officer nearby stop by and ask the guy to turn it off. PD Officers tend to have a little more authoritative apperance then a couple of CAP officers at 2 in the morning.

If we followed that logic the vast majority of CAP's ELT/EPIRB missions, which usually take place in urban areas would be unnecessary.  Unless there wasn't a CAP team available for several hours, then it will usually be faster to give the misison to us rather than have local officers knocking on doors at random somewhere near the coordinates. 

[Hawk200]

Unless there wasn't a CAP team available for several hours, then it will usually be faster to give the misison to us rather than have local officers knocking on doors at random somewhere near the coordinates. 

The primary ES guru for our wing usually makes it a policy to contact the local PD or Sherrif's Department when they get to an area, and have an officer or deputy accompany them. Seems practical, and you don't have anyone wondering if the guys in funny uniforms are legit or not.

[DNall]

^ we do that a lot also, depending on the area/situation we're going into.

In this case CAP got the call when LE wasn't able to do the job. AFRCC's job is to make sure no one is in distress. They have to call the state first. CAP only comes in if the state CANNOT do the job and THEY decide to let AFRCC use other resources to take care of it. Whatever MOU is in place may streamline that a bit but that's the state granting AFRCC the authority to use CAP when appropriate & w/o taking cops off the street. In this case it sound like CG did the signal search & LE cleaned it up. When they couldn't find it & there was still a signal THEN you alert CAP, & in this case w/ 2 negative passes you should hold your team at base to see if it goes away, and that's assuming you even have them come to base. This shouldn't be news to anyone.

[Bluelakes 13]

I always ask the IC to call County Sheriff and tell them we're doing ops in the neighborhood.  The last few missions a deputy showed up and wanted to tag along because he had nothing else to do. 

Nothing better when it's 1am, cold, have 2 cadets in th back, and a police escort!

[Dragoon]

If they've got a good address, by all means send someone else to go knock on the door.  Or just call the guy. 

But when the address is bad (or wrong) or no one is home - that's where our value will continue to come into play.

[DNall]

Cause god forbid a non-dstress ELT narrowed two a couple of houses not get turned off. I wouldn't call that value added. We will still get those missions of course. Talking about it this wknd with a couple folks, I'm not sure how it's going to go. I'm sure a lot of the old ones will go off, but no one will be able to tell us about it.

[Dragoon]

You miss the point.

Not all 406's have GPS. Having a "good address" doesn't mean you know where the ELT is.  It means you know where the OWNER is.

And if you can't reach him, you have to go find the ELT.  The coordinates will be better than they are today (406 is more accurate), but not by any means perfect.

Plus...I'd wager that airlines, towers  and others will continue to moniter 121.5 and hear and report signals on that band.

[DNall]

Not all 406's have GPS. Having a "good address" doesn't mean you know where the ELT is.  It means you know where the OWNER is.

And if you can't reach him, you have to go find the ELT.  The coordinates will be better than they are today (406 is more accurate), but not by any means perfect.

Plus...I'd wager that airlines, towers  and others will continue to moniter 121.5 and hear and report signals on that band.

That's all true, but again the point is to find the distress call fast as possible not turn off non-distress beacons. If they knew they were non-distress they wouldn't send anyone out.

95% of all missions CAP does are non-distress ELT. CG reports over 80% registration on the new ones. AFRCC is pretty good about sorting these things out before they alert anyone, what percentage of missions does that knock out? Okay, now you got GPS on some & fairly accurate position on the others. AFRCC calls the state, they send cops to check the location, if that turns up a plane then they take care of it, if not then it's non-distress. CAP may still get the call as in the situation above, but since it's 99.995% non-distress then you're not going to get the time or budget to spend on a search, also you're going to get the call longer after the fact & a some of those are going to die on you. Since we aren't doing so much work we aren't going to need so much gear, harder to justify the money every year to support it. Yeah, we'll still get some 121.5 off pireps & such, but those are very few & far between now, that's not going to change, most ramp folks turn most of their's own off anyway.

[Smokey]

I recently attended the SAR Management Course put on by AFRCC.....some states have requirements that AFRCC notify folks other than CAP , even in ELT and overdue aircraft.  The AFRCC is mandated to follow the MOU and cannot just call CAP if the MOU doesn't spell it out. 

Some states, as I found out, have a different pecking order. Example...an overdue aircraft is given to the state aeronautics agency who can then decide if they want CAP involved.  AFRCC cannot task CAP w/o permission of that agency.

Don't know if that is the case here......but it could be.   Never knew about this kinda stuff before the course.


PS......If you can attend the AFRCC SMC ( 2 days)  I highly recommend you attend. It's not just for ICs.  Very informative and nice folks teaching it.  Plus you get a nifty patch you can wear on your BDU or zoom bag.

[lordmonar]

PS......If you can attend the AFRCC SMC ( 2 days)  I highly recommend you attend. It's not just for ICs.  Very informative and nice folks teaching it.  Plus you get a nifty patch you can wear on your BDU or zoom bag.

Ohh!  I'm there!

No seriously....I was just on the AFRCC website and training looks very informative.

[DNall]

did it back in the day, very good stuff.

[Dragoon]

Yeah, we'll still get some 121.5 off pireps & such, but those are very few & far between now, that's not going to change, most ramp folks turn most of their's own off anyway.

Maybe where YOU live.  I've never seen a ramp folk turn off an ELT.  And that includes some major air bases in the area.  They seem very content to wait for us.

[DNall]

They're about the only ones that call us for ELTs other than the sat hits & that's only if they can't find it. I don't personally like getting up at 3am & I been on enough non-distress missions to tide me over a couple lifetimes, so we try to educate them. You narrow it to a hanger & have to wait 45mins for the owner, "hey ramp guy, let me show you how to use that scanner." If it's actually on the ramp & they got two brain cells & 5mins to spare they'll get it. If it's in a hanger & bouncing all to hell then we may have to help them out.

I tell them, "If there's a non-distress beacon going off & a real crash the satellite can't get a good fix on either one, it may average the locations together or narrow in on one or the other, but basically that thing beeping away over there can put the lives of other aviators at risk, so go find it & get it turned off ASAP. If you can't find it we'll come help you, but don't ignore it." I don't know how strictly true that is, I'm not an expert. We talked about some multi-signal sat issues at SMC back in the day, and that may be overstating the issue a bit but not entirely. It sure as hell makes them take it seriously though. Tell my cadets & pilots/mechanics the same stuff & they suddenly get real vigilant. We don't get crap from pireps or towers though, maybe one every few years, and we do 300-400 a year in the Wg