Wellness
Signaling: Help Them Find You
Lesson time 15:51 min
Learn how to signal for help and effectively aid rescuers in your recovery.
Students give MasterClass an average rating of 4.7 out of 5 stars
Topics include: Electronic: Work With Devices • Pyrotechnic: Smoke, Fire, and Flares • Ground to Air: Signals Are All Around You • Signal Mirror: Grab Their Attention • Look for a Recovery Site
Teaches Wilderness Survival
Wilderness survival expert and former Air Force SERE specialist Jessie Krebs teaches you the skills to explore nature safely and confidently.
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[MUSIC PLAYING] - Signaling is so important. It's a really good thing to know. And, unfortunately, there's so many people out there that don't know it. And it's often to their peril, right. Where they end up in trouble. They end up stuck either for longer than they had hoped or wanted to, and sometimes people end up dead because of it. So we want to make ourselves big, and there are three primary ways in which we can do that. [MUSIC PLAYING] So our three main primary ways of signaling. One that we hopefully think about fairly often, and it's amazing to me in my classes is how many people kind of forget about it, is electronic. We have all of these electronic means at our disposal, right. We could have ones that go off. And they simply go off. You hit the button. Turn it on, and it's just broadcasting. It says, I'm over here. This is sort of what they might have, like we think of the black box when a plane goes down. Once it senses that there's distress or something's happened, it just starts going off. So there's that type of a signal, where you buy a particular unit and you-- that just-- you turn it on and it just does its thing. And I don't need to buy a subscription, which sometimes happens with some of these other types of devices, where I buy the unit but I can't just take this unit after I bought it, go up in the field and say, uh-oh, I'm in trouble, and hit the SOS. It's not going to work. I literally have to be subscribed to that company. And then it will work. And some of these do have an advantage, though. Instead of just going off and saying, hey, I'm over here, somebody come help, right, and maybe getting a $20,000 helicopter ride for a sprained ankle. If I don't want that, then having these types of units can be pretty handy. Because with these, I can often text in exactly what I want to happen, right. Or you can think of a satellite phone, as well. That's another type where I can simply call up rescue or text them and say, hey, I've got a sprained ankle, or something's wrong. It doesn't feel real stable. I just need you to contact my brother and send him on out here, right. Great, easy-peasy. And then I'm not paying for that helicopter, which oftentimes you will be doing. But don't let that stop you from calling in rescue if you really need it. [MUSIC PLAYING] Most of us get fascinated by fire. If we're sitting around a campfire, we can say, one channel, everybody watches. So fire is always awesome. It's really bright at night. So at nighttime, it's the flame itself we're looking for. Or during the day, it's going to be usually the smoke. They do have things though, man-made things that we can use, that actually go off like fireworks and are so bright that even during the day they can be seen really well. Things like this, which is a marine flare. So we can take off one of these, pop it, and shoot it up, right. And these usually go about 300 feet or so up, and then explode...
About the Instructor
As a former Air Force SERE (survival, evasion, resistance, and escape) specialist, wilderness survival expert Jessie Krebs spent 30 years preparing people for the unexpected. Now she’s teaching you the mindset and skills to safely explore the outdoors. Learn essential survival techniques—from signaling for help to reading a map, finding water, making shelter, and more—and embark on your next adventure with confidence.
Featured MasterClass Instructor
Jessie Krebs
Wilderness survival expert and former Air Force SERE specialist Jessie Krebs teaches you the skills to explore nature safely and confidently.
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