This post at kottke.org illustrates a problem with the user interface on many mapping applications. The application is supposed to show you where your phone is, but when it can’t determine the position accurately, it attempts to find a general…
Blog Archives
Canadian Avalanche Air Bag study
Avalanche Balloon packs, or “Air Bags” (see WildSnow.com for an excellent overview of the current offerings) have been out for a few years, and other than anecdotal evidence, or data compiled by the manufacturers, there hasn’t been a lot of independent and peer reviewed study…
Measuring Smartphone GPS accuracy
I’ve often wondered about how a Smartphone GPS would stack up against a purpose built wilderness GPS. I suspected that it would not perform as well because the GPS antenna is not as big. Following up on yesterday’s post on…
Calculating your own GPS accuracy
In my post on GPS accuracy I made some claims about the accuracy of GPS devices and used a graphic that was created by a third party that may have confused the issue for some people, as it appeared to…
Your GPS is lying to you
At the very least, you’re probably misinterpreting what it’s saying. People’s attitudes toward GPS devices are very interesting. Since 2000, when selective availability was turned off, GPS has become ubiquitous to the point where most people have one and interact with it on…
BC Life expectancy highest in Canada
There’s a report from last year that shows that British Columbia’s life expectancy is the highest in Canada. There’s another one today that shows that BC men now lead the world in life expectancy, with women outliving men, but coming in 6th in…
Map of SAR Incidents in BC 2011
My good friend Rick Laing, SAR Manager and member of Ridge Meadows SAR and GIS guru sent me a link to a map he published. It has the locations of all of the SAR teams in BC, and includes all of…
On the Language of Science
In some posts on this blog I make a big deal about things like “error” and “uncertainty”; I’ve used these terms when describing points on a map that are generated from a GPS, and in describing statistics pertaining to accidents…
Popularity of snowshoeing
In my article on snowshoe accidents, I noted that snowshoeing seemed to be growing in popularity, but could not find an industry reference on the numbers involved. Well, I found one that tracks numbers for the American market. The Outdoor…
Frequency of SAR Incidents
Most SAR teams maintain records of each incident independently from PEP, but even if they didn’t I’m sure they would all agree; there are more SAR incidents in the summer than in the winter. Further, calls come with greater frequency…
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