by Yank Elliott

Created on: April 05, 2007   Last Updated: April 27, 2007

Why a map and compass is just as good as a global positioning system

There is no doubt about the value of GPS devices. We frequently hear of lost hikers and others in the wilderness being found because of rescuers being able to pinpoint their location. I have personal knowledge of the value of GPS in desperate situations.

The first problem arose during a fishing trip with my son and his friend during mid summer off the North Carolina coast. The weather was hot and there was a heavy haze in the air reducing visibility to one hundred yards. Our home port was Oregon Inlet on the Outer Banks. We were pursuing billfish and hooked up with several sailfish (all released) off the Virginia coast a couple of hundred miles from home. That was great fun because we had two on at the same time, jumping all over the place. A beautiful sight.

Being the guest on the trip I had nothing at all to do with charting the trip and had absolutely no knowledge of how much gas we had or even where we were. I was just along for a very pleasant trip though there was nothing to see because of the low visibility. The GPS was just carrying us along.

After a while I realized the two boys were sort of consulting with each other. My experience alerted me to possible problems so I joined them without saying anything. It wasn't long until the problems emerged. We could not see where we were (only GPS knew) and we had less than 20 minutes of gas left. And the Atlantic is so big!

Lo and behold, with about five minutes left on the gas, the Oregon Inlet Bridge appeared out of nowhere. We all kissed GPS (ugh!).

And then there was the time my son asked me to ride with him to take his boat out of harm's way before Hurricane Floyd. Like a lot of stuff young folks do everything was at the last minute. The boat was new and this was the first voyage. He set the GPS for every marker on the six-hour (remember this time) trip to his home dock and off we went.

Nobody touched the wheel for the entire six hours-no even once. We saw many vessels making for safe harbor and we even went by several boats evacuating people from the barrier islands. Thinking of all the possibilities for trouble my heart kept inching up in my throat. But all was well. We started to approach the home dock and got within about 50 feet when the motor became silent. I asked how long the manual said you could run on a tank of gas and guess what was the answer? SIX HOURS!

GPS came through again.

But consider what might have happened if the GPS battery or other related electronic system had gone down. In both situations we would have been in serious trouble. The moral of these stories is if you are going into these kinds of activities you ought to know how to find your way without GPS. Low-tech map and compass is something necessary to know whether you ever use them or not.

Learn more about this author, Yank Elliott.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.