Mulling over Daryl Stout to Steve Asher 09 Jan 2005

Hi Daryl...

SA>Global Positioning System (GPS)-equipped mobile phones and other
  >devices are rapidly emerging as tools allowing people to track the
  >whereabouts of truant children, spouses, workers, pets, and others,

 DS>   One of the amateur radio digital modes is a deal developed by Bob
 DS> Bruninga, WB4APR...called the Automatic Position Reporting System,
 DS> or APRS for short. Programs for DOS, Windows, and I think even
 DS> Macintosh systems...are used by ham radio operators in a wide range
 DS> of situations...from tracking severe weather...to tracking
 DS> participants in a race...among other things. Depending on their
 DS> computer and rig setups, hams can manually update their position,
 DS> or link with an attached GPS to input that data for them.

GPS, of course, can be a lifesaver, especially in a sparsely populated
country like Oz, where people die on Outback tracks, or in mountain
wilderness in Tasmania etc. I doubt the yachts in the Sydney-Hobart
race would object to being tracked by GPS when they are caught in a
storm, capsize, lose a mast etc. I never heard anything about ham
operators during & after the tsunami, but I guess they are still 
very useful in such emergencies, when phone networks are destroyed.

Cheers, Steve..

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