Flares: should we give up carrying them?

[bedajim]

Originally Posted by bedajim

I have one of these + normal flares, no idea if it's any good

http://www.rescue-flares.co.uk/Rescue_laser_flare.html

Had a play with this last night it showed on the trees and chimney pots on the far side of the village 600 -700m even with all of the light pollution, it gives off a flat bar of light.

And no helicopter turned up, which i think is good


Jim

[Pete7]

Originally Posted by m chappelow

i dont see why with modern chemicals that the expirery dates cannot be made longer to at least 5 years rather than around 3 ,and i dont see why hand helds cannot be set off on bonfire night in inland areas with care ,i know with the para ones they could still be burning and land on a house roof possibly setting fire to the plastic gutters ect ,

Profits for flare manufacturers would dip if the replacement date changed to 5 years, so they are not going to do that without a fight.

We used up our old hand held flares over the Christmas holiday whilst having a bonfire in the garden, great for getting it going with a drop of petrol btw. All the expired 2006 or later hand helds fired first time, however some 2005 flares didn't and had to be left on the bonfire to cook. The orange smokes were set off at night so they didn't cause a problem.

Is there still a justification to carry flares? I think so but will probably now reduce the quantity down to hand helds and smoke.

Pete

[JSP]

Couple of questions,

With LED's and lasers your relying on small batteries to not let you down, ones that aren't fond of water. I know there's already small battery powered things in the marine world but when it comes to a matter of life and death, would you fell safe relying on them?

And I've got a tub of out of date coastle flares in the shed, what the hell do I do with them now ?

[Poly]

Originally Posted by JSP

With LED's and lasers your relying on small batteries to not let you down, ones that aren't fond of water. I know there's already small battery powered things in the marine world but when it comes to a matter of life and death, would you fell safe relying on them?

Life jacket lights, PLBs, VHF, etc all potentially life saving and all battery powered, and many of them are quite reliable. There are certainly reports of both in and out of date flares failing to fire so not sure it is any worse.

And I've got a tub of out of date coastle flares in the shed, what the hell do I do with them now ?

call your local CG (not 999) and ask if you can drop them in at a convenient time.

[JSP]

Originally Posted by Polwart

Life jacket lights, PLBs, VHF, etc all potentially life saving and all battery powered, and many of them are quite reliable. There are certainly reports of both in and out of date flares failing to fire so not sure it is any worse.

That's a bloody good point!

call your local CG (not 999) and ask if you can drop them in at a convenient time.

I thought they weren't taking them anymore?

[Poly]

Originally Posted by JSP

I thought they weren't taking them anymore?

they don't want to take them any more, thats not the same thing! they know that without a viable alternative people will just dump them off the side of their boats at sea and then they wash up on the beach and are the CG's problem.

[Pete7]

Originally Posted by JSP

And I've got a tub of out of date coastle flares in the shed, what the hell do I do with them now ?

Guess you never played pass the parcel then

You could leave them on board for the next owner

[wavelength]

they don't want to take them any more

thats a bold statement and who are "they"????
As said before we will take them at our cg station from private bods but we wont come out for them so JSP does not have a problem let me know and i will meet you there when I have a spare moment - which is not for a week or three cos I am run off m'feet just now - holland this week IoM week after

[willk]

Originally Posted by Pete7

We used up our old hand held flares over the Christmas holiday whilst having a bonfire in the garden, great for getting it going with a drop of petrol btw.

Once upon a time there was a party round mine at which there were a lot of drunken divers (oddly enough)... What was strange was that by 0400 there was still a lot of drink left and therefore, no sign of the divers departing.

This WAS an emergency. I found an out of date flare and suggested we fire it in the garden - the entire place emptied out for the spectacle after which I said Goodnight, Goodbye and shut the door
____________________________
and no Helicopters arrived either...

[codprawn]

Originally Posted by bedajim

Had a play with this last night it showed on the trees and chimney pots on the far side of the village 600 -700m even with all of the light pollution, it gives off a flat bar of light.

And no helicopter turned up, which i think is good


Jim

How wide was the beam - it may have had long range but how big an area did it light up?

[JSP]

Originally Posted by wavelength

thats a bold statement and who are "they"????
As said before we will take them at our cg station from private bods but we wont come out for them so JSP does not have a problem let me know and i will meet you there when I have a spare moment - which is not for a week or three cos I am run off m'feet just now - holland this week IoM week after

Which Station is it Dave? Thought only Liverpool took them in. I'll give you a shout in a couple of weeks then
Boats no longer in Fleetwood dock, it's in Frecklton boat yard now. But still go up to fleetwood dock to see my folks.

[Doug Stormforce]

Originally Posted by SeaSkills

It's probably something to do with the 2-day training course for RNLI flare demonstrators, the several pages of risk assessment needed for every demonstration, and the many phone calls and emails before each event to advise the coastguard, police, fire service, air traffic control, local lifeboat etc etc (and calling them again immediately before and after the event to remind them).

No distress flares are used, just hand-held smokes, and white pinpoints and parachutes.

Nonetheless, the wind-up call to the coastguard afterwards always includes feedback on how many 999 calls came in

Clearly different organistaion go about things differently

We have been providing flare demonstations and in fact letting students have a go at firing live flares since the business started (2001). I think it is one of the most valuable bits of training we provide and it is a key featurs of our Sea Survival course.

Flares are potentially very dangerous, but if used correctly are safe. They have to be treated with respect but I believe the experience of firing them for real in a controlled environment better equips you for the day you might need to use them for real.

We have a short writen policy on how the session is to be run. Its basically common sense but we give new Sea Survival and ISAF Instructors a short training session on how to deliver the session themselves.

We don't call anyone until about 3 minutes before we start, then we call Solent Coast Guard and tell them what we are up to. At the end of the sesison we call them again. We do not call anyone else. At a quick estimate I would say we have run well over 500 of these sessions and to date had no problmes.

We do the session on the water front of the River Itchen, the Itchen is used by most aircraft landing at Southampton Airport for their pilotage. No one has yet complained. We dont email anybody, we dont bother talking to the local lifeboat as they are co ordinated by the Coast Guard, we dont bother talking to the Police as they would only pass anything onto the Coast Guard.

[John Kennett]

That sounds like a much more sensible approach

[chewy]

Having fired both parachute and handheld flares I'd rather fire the parachute any day, no fun fun trying to hold onto burning explosive.

I bought an anchor off ebay and the seller kindly stuck an out of date flare in the parcel for me. When asked he said "I thought you might have wanted it!"

When we have a flare that fails to fire at sea we are taught to stick a knife in the end of it and flush it with water. No chance, I'll be throwing it as far as I can from the boat!

Just to add more confusion to it all the RNLI can't get the white para flares, I just checked ours on the boat and the expiry was 07/08.
I think its Pains Wessex that supply ours and for some reason they will only supply them to the MOD now not the RNLI, don't ask why we don't use a different manufacturer?

[Steve_B]

It's nearly 20years since I last "played" with flares, when as part of the RNR we let off both flares and thunder flashes.

At Stormforce yesterday for the Sea Survial, we did go through the live firing. It was one of the most valuable exercises I have done in a long time. It provides confidence and reassurance about flares and also gets rid of alot of the myths that have built up.

A great day Doug keep it up.

I do and will continue to carry them on board, whilst I know that one might fail, in general they will always be more reliable than anything requiring volts in a time of distress.
Steve

[m chappelow]

well i suppose we could go back to the old distress signal of the burning barrel of tar on the fore deck,

[chewy]

A few years back someone did that off Cornwall and set fire to the rest of the boat!

[SPR]

Before I go on, I must state that am an Authorised UK Importer & Reseller of Rescue Laser Flares; and owner of the site mentioned before on this forum that sells them.

Rescue Lasers Flares and Laser Pointers are two different products,

The rescue flares produce a line of light as previously stated, that progressive gets bigger the large distance its projected. So the time it hits the aircraft its a massive line. The flashing affect is caused by moving the flare side to side across your fingers that you use to sight. (would normally link to site here with instructions, but don't want to advertise).

This prevents blinding the pilots, last thing that you really want to crash your the helicopter coming to rescue you!

These have been approved by the USA authorities and have been supplied to USA military and coastguard. I believe the Spanish Airforce are using these too. I have supplied units to UK governmental agencies.

An independent review can be found at the following:

http://www.equipped.org/rescuelaser.htm

Myke Hawke ((http://www.mykehawke.com/) and Five Gadget Show Review:

http://fwd.five.tv/gadgets/all/great...e-laser-flares

The downside to the rescue laser flare is that its is directional, and its designed to be used as pinpoint instead of parachute replacement. To guide rescuers to your location. (How many times you watched the TV rescue shows where the Helicopter cant find the causality.)

I still carry parachute flares on my boat, as last resort, since these can be seen in all directions.

One last point, the Laser flares can be used for picking up retro-reflective tape, when the laser hits the object you get bright flash back, this is useful in finding MOB at night or people in the hills if they have the retro-reflective tape in the clothing.

Any Questions on this product feel free to ask me, and I will do my best to honestly answer them.


Scott






A Laser pointer is focus dot of light, that will temp blind a pilot by leaving a dot in his eye.

[codprawn]

Thanks for some accurate info. As I said they are pretty directional devices unlike a normal parachute flare that can be seen over a huge area.

Of course they have their place like everything else and having a bit of a fetish for bright shiny things I will probably get one soon.

[wavelength]

Which Station is it Dave

Fleetwood just e mail me and I will meet you there if I am available and actually in the area for a change. This week possibly or the next one is easier. Then its off to the IoM with a commercial boat and when I get back it will be getting towards Ribex.