All we can do is set minimum requirements that we feel are the best mix in keeping people safe.
I'm a huge proponent of personal responsibility and love the quote above, but the 15 pages( pretty excessive) of SIs that I read seem to contradict that. I'll read the updated version and reconsider. The more you dictate the more responsibility you assume as the OA. Your race ,your call but I think you are regulating yourself into a fix instead of out of one. I want this race to flourish as much or more than anyone so this isn't being a hater. Your SPOT comment about letting you see if someone was in trouble will only lead to trouble if you call in the Calvary and someone stopped because they wanted a sandwich. Besides , after all of the races that I've participated in and tried to follow that involved SPOTs I'd surmise that reliability is "SPOTTY" at best. I guess that's how they got their name. I'll trust my life to an EPIRB, if organizers want to publicize the race with SPOTs then that should be their responsibility not mine, financially or otherwise.
Spots are great, but they're tickling with liability issues with some of their promises. They're being sued right now over the Aegean incident (which may or may not make sense). It's a terrific device and has a definite use, but it just doesn't have the direct line/monitoring of emergency help and I would never rely on one as my backup plan (maybe a tertiary level) - it's not intrinsically built for the purpose of safety like an epirb is. That's some government oversight we should all be pleased with.
This is exactly why Kathy veto'd the SPOT option and insisted on the EPIRB. We have carried the SPOT before and she pretty much said the same thing as Todd. For some reason she wants to get me back, go figure.
"Do or do not. There is no try." - Yoda "Excuses are the tools of the weak and incompetent" - Two sista's I overheard in the hall "You don't have to be a brain surgeon to be a complete idiot, but it helps"
