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IQALUIT
It's been three years since the Government of Nunavut purchased 500 SPOT tracking devices - 20 for every community - and tracking data shows that when SPOTs are activated, search-and-rescues have been carried out with 100 per cent success.

Ed Zebedee, director of protection services for the GN shows a Blackberry-sized portable SPOT device and the Blackberry message he receives when a SPOT's "help" function is activated. - Peter Worden/NNSL photo

Fifty-three of the 167 searches carried out in 2012 were SPOT-activated, according to Ed Zebedee, director of protection services for the GN. Those 53 searches resulted in those lost being brought home alive.

Zebedee's government-issued Blackberry is one of three devices that will receive a notice every five minutes night and day until a rescue is completed. He displayed a recent notice, this one from near Rankin Inlet, with a GPS map and info such as which SPOT unit was borrowed and the ages and health conditions of all travellers.

Zebedee joked about being resigned to sleeping on the couch while a search – which have lasted this past year from 2.5 to 1,700 hours – is ongoing, but he knows these life-or-death devices are no laughing matter. The new search-and-rescue databank keeps tabs on all activations and shows weather conditions, ages of people rescued, and "everything except what you had for breakfast," said Zebedee. Statistically-speaking, one rescue is carried out roughly every 1.6 days. Last week there were four. One weekend there were seven. Zebedee got very little sleep.

With sea ice not fully formed and Christmas holidays around the corner, 'tis the season, said Zebedee, when people go out on the land without SPOT device because they're not traversing long distances.

"People don't tend to think of the likelihood of something happening if they're not going the greater distances. But if you don't know where somebody is, it's pretty difficult when they do get reported overdue," he said. "You're relying on what they told friends and family where they were going or the local hunting knowledge."

His advice to everyone: pick up a SPOT before going out on the land, even as a back-up to a satellite phone – the batteries of such have been known to die.

The SPOT initiative began in 2012 after several major searches requiring thousands of man-hours and a lot of money. The GN purchased and activated the 500 devices rated for 40-below and made them available through hamlet offices and Hunter Trapper Organizations in each community. The annual activation fee is costly, said Zebedee, at about $53,000, but that's roughly equivalent to about two days of Twin Otter flight-time.

The devices are simple to use and rigorously tested. Hold one button for three seconds and it sends a "help" message to Zebedee's and two others' government-Blackberries. Hit the "911" function and a call centre in Texas alerts the closest authority. At all times, SPOT tracks your location every 15 minutes. A SPOT can float in the ocean for hours or remain buried in a snowbank for months. Zebedee personally tested the first SPOTs for six months.

"We weren't gentle. We took no special care of them because we knew if they're going out with a hunter he's going to throw it in his snowmobile or qamutiik, and if they're fragile or don't like the cold, they're of no use to us."

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