SAFA Skysailor Magazine

18 SKY SAILOR January | February 2022 This article follows on from the ‘Sending out an SOS’ article in the last issue of SkySailor. In this one, I want to share with you some of the tools available that enable us to keep an eye on pilots in the air. First up though, there is one other satellite messaging device I have recently become aware of that you may be interested in. This is the Zoleo Communicator . As with the other satellite comms devices covered last issue, you will need to purchase a service subscription as well as the unit. The Zoleo utilises the Iridium network and connects to an app on your mobile phone so you can type messages to send and view those received. Live tracking is available, but requires one of the upgraded subscription plans. SOS and check- in come as standard. Now to this issue’s topic: What tools are avail- able out there that enable you to see what is going on with pilots in the sky or on the ground? Native solutions – InReach and Spot We’ll start by looking at native solutions from Garmin and Spot, then dive into a few of the solutions that yours truly uses. This is not going to be an exhaustive trawl through all available options, just some I have found and utilise. There are many tracking sources available, such as Flymaster Live, XC Track Live etc.; investigate those at your leisure. I want to cover the tools I use and to display and share information you may find useful. Both device manufacturers offer native mapping solutions to keep track of your device. The first thing you need to do with any device is to set up their tracking capabilities. Garmin Disclaimer: I have not played around with setting up a Garmin, since I don’t have one. However, Gavin McClurg has done all the hard work for you and set up an informative page on his Cloudbase Mayhem website describing the whole process. Since Gav put this together, Garmin changed a lot of pages, breaking the links. Gavin has recently updated these: www.cloudbasemayhem.com Once all that is done you should end up with a shared map page link. The link can be dropped straight into a web browser address field and the tracker’s information will appear in the Garmin web mapping application. From this, folks can message you when you have your inReach turned on: Figure 2: Garmin mapping and messaging There are another couple of outputs available from the Garmin set-up process – a Garmin inReach email address and a feed link. The Garmin email address is how anyone with an Tools for Tracking by Iain Clarke – SAFA Safety Management Officer Figure 1: Zoleo Communicator