I have been following that story of the SF family that got stranded in the
Oregon coast mountains
my son asked what we would do if our 2 wd westy got stuck/broke down in some
remote winter area

besides that fact we prolly have 2 weeks of food , propane, dual bats etc &
some Garmin 2 way radios
we would prolly just hole up & camp out :)

The interesting aspect was that the attempt to make a cell phone call and
the cdr records allowed
the searchers to grid search a cell phone tower coverage grid this allowed
them to be located
if everyone has stayed put the story would have a happy ending ...

I was curious the Garmin rino 530 i always have in the van is GPS enabled &
allows other Garmin
2 ways to track to each other bu the coverage is only 2 miles in bad terrain
Yet I can usually get a GPS fix as long as there is not much tree cover just
about any remote locations..

Are there any inexpensive devices that would send a gps fix to international
emergency satalite
the allow searches to home in on sone lost / stranded in the westy
wilderness ?