Title text:
‘Oh no, the box is drifting out into the harbor!’ ‘Yeah, I wouldn’t worry about losing it.’
Transcript:
Transcript will show once it’s been added to explainxkcd.com
Source: https://xkcd.com/3169/
Title text:
‘Oh no, the box is drifting out into the harbor!’ ‘Yeah, I wouldn’t worry about losing it.’
Transcript:
Transcript will show once it’s been added to explainxkcd.com
Source: https://xkcd.com/3169/
I have a handheld one—to float with me in a liferaft, etc—and it gets registered to a vessel or vehicle. Whenever I want to use it on something different, contact the federal government, advise of the new vessel ID or vehicle registration, and it’s now associated with the new one.
I don’t think it matters much since it is a beacon after all, but I think it helps in searching. Also, a lot of other details are registered along with it so they know who to send the tens of thousands in fines to if I somehow bypass all three “Are you really sure?” switches and fire the thing off inappropriately.
Any chance what you have is not an EPIRB, but a SART? SARTs are only registered with beacon ID and doesn’t require programming. Shows up on radar and sometimes AIS also. No sat comms involved.