Learn how to grow your business and meet other like minded farmers with FG26/46, Farmers Guardians business skills group. Use of satellite locators now legal in the UK
THE news that personal locater beacons (PLBs) can now be legally used throughout the UK has been welcomed by NFU Scotland as a ‘potentially lifesaving tool’ for farmers.
PLBs (known as EPIRBs for sea travel and ELTs for air travel) are already available for use in the aviation and maritime industries as part of the existing licensing and registration regime, regulated by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency on behalf of the Department for Transport.
With the change in the law they are expected to be used on land, primarily by those engaged in recreational/outdoor pursuits, but may also be used by lone workers in a variety of different occupations taking them into rural areas.
It is anticipated they will potentially speed up the ability to get help to those in distress in remote or isolated locations, by transmitting unique identification information, providing positional data and sending out a continuous homing transmission.
This will help emergency services to locate casualties and has the potential to remove the need for lengthy arduous and expensive search activity.
An NFUS spokesman said: “The number of farmers working by themselves has undoubtedly increased over the years, and with lone working comes increased safety concerns.
“Farmers and their staff who do work alone, particularly in remote areas with few landmarks, will find PLBs useful both for peace of mind on the average day, and as a potentially lifesaving tool in an emergency.
“Farming is a dangerous industry to work within, with a poor Health and Safety record to date and so we welcome this change in the law which will allow farmers to make use of this existing safety technology.”
The police across the UK are the co-ordinating authority for all land-based search and rescue incidents and they have welcomed the change in the law.
In a joint statement, Deputy Chief Constable Andy Cowie on behalf of Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) in Scotland and DCC Ian Shannon on behalf of the ACPO in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, said it could potentially help saves lives in the hills across the UK, as well as reducing the risk to rescuers and mountain rescue teams.
“If we can take advantage of today’s technology to help manage and minimise the risk to rescuers and help speed up the whole rescue process, in an emergency, there is no doubt we can save lives that might otherwise be lost.
“It will also help reduce the burden on volunteer rescue teams and searchers across the UK. Satellite coverage is much wider than mobile coverage and we have to take advantage of that.”
