Assisted Fine Search and Probing Indication

The two last phases of the search take place in the immediate vicinity of the buried subject. Whereas the fine search is carried out with the transceiver, pinpointing for the buried subject is done by the probe in a spiral shaped search pattern and concludes the search with a physical probe hit. The transceiver search for a buried subject in the last few meters of the search is a challenging compromise between search time and search accuracy in particular for companion rescuers with limited training. Furthermore, many rescuers struggle with the decision when to stop transceiver search and start probing - always trying to get even closer with the transceiver, even though the required fine search precision for a human body sized object has already been achieved and only the immediate application of the probing spiral further shortens search time. Up to a few years ago, a bracketing method was applied by all user groups while fine searching with the transceiver. Bracketing allows precise searches in shallow to medium burial depth, but requires an extensive level of training and routine for fast and precise results. Due to the often inefficient and unsystematic approach, the majority of the users spent far too much time in this phase compared to the gain of search precision they were able to achieve.

Fine Search in a Cross This lead to the development of the airport approach method, which describes the last phase of the transceiver search as an analogy to landing an airplane on the runway of an airport and therefore a continuation on a straight line avoiding any bracketing. The method lead to considerably faster search times, however, when searchers did not properly follow the direction indications on the screen while approaching the immediate vicinity of the buried subject, the straight line of the runway was imprecisely aligned and lateral offsets where likely and lead to increased times for probing. Independent of the alignment of a runway, the lowest distance indication approximately appears where the rescuer is in the closest point between the runway and the buried subject. In an optimal case, this is directly above the buried subject, if the runway is not optimally aligned, the lateral offset approx. is in a 90 degree angle from it.

Airport Approach Optimal runway Runway with lateral offset

Searching for a better performance in transceiver search in close proximity to the buried subject independent of the user level, the balance between search precision and search time needs to be optimized. A totally new approach has been taken concerning high precision fine searching: With digital transceiver technology, the lowest point in distance indication based on signal strength received in all antennas (3D) of the device has become the determining criteria on where to change direction while bracketing or to start probing. Unfortunately, geometry makes that changes in distance indication in the last few meters above the buried subject become less distinct the more the burial depth increases. Therefore, the search accuracy of this approach decreases with increasing burial depth. On the base of fine searching in a circle, a high precision search system designed for deep burials, the new approach analyses the vector or of each antenna individually and determines at higher precision than the 3D-based distance indication where the rescuer needs to change axis while bracketing in fine search and where spiral probing should be initiated.

Assisted Fine Search and Probing Indication To conclude, the assisted fine search and probing indication: - overcomes the problem of traditional bracketing by indicating where and when to change direction - overcomes the problem of imprecisely aligned runways applied in the airport approach - combines the precision of fine search in a circle with the speed and ease of the airport approach - optimizes the search time by indicating where and when stop fine search and start probing