New Device Puts Search Unit on the Right Track

It’s not often that members of the Sheriff Department’s volunteer Search and Rescue Unit get lost.

But Friday, while training to use a computerized navigational and communications tool, the volunteers and eight sheriff’s deputies spent much of their morning wandering the fields and parking lots around Camarillo Airport. The Global Positioning System devices they carried make finding lost people more easier than the traditional map and compass method.

While several members of the unit have used the device on missions during the past year, the system takes a little practice.

On Friday, volunteers became familiar with the system while trying to track their locations and find items near the airport.

“I’m not sure what I’m doing, to tell you the truth. Right now I’m trying to find my car,” said volunteer Command Post Capt. Kerry Hellstrom.

The system is a sophisticated compass. With buttons and a display screen, it is housed in a lightweight, hand-held device that looks like a cross between a cellular phone, a computer game and compass.

According to search and rescue coordinator Earl Matthews, the advantages over a compass and map are that it is more precise and easier to use in bad weather, provides search routes and keeps track of all locations visited by a user.

“One of the best things about this is that after you give it the coordinates of your destination, it will give you a route to get there,” Matthews said.

Volunteers were also impressed with its efficiency.

“The command post can give us the coordinates over the radio and all we have to do is put it into the GPS and we know exactly where to go. They also know where we are at all times,” said field team volunteer Mike Reynolds.

Once coordinates are punched in, users simply start walking. Arrows on the display screen show the direction they are traveling and the direction to reach the destination.

The devices, which retail for $140 to $250, can be purchased by consumers and are increasingly being used by campers and hikers, Matthews said.

“Recently we had a guy with an injured leg call us on his cellular phone, and he was able to give us his location through his GPS,” Matthews said.

The Magellan Systems Corp., which provided the training Friday, recently donated 40 of the devices to the search and rescue team, doubling the team’s supply.