TV transmits homing signal

[Gwarsbane]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...d_television_dc

TV Emits Distress Signal, Triggers Search

EUGENE, Oregon (Reuters) - TV hardly gets much better than this.

 

An Oregon man discovered earlier this month that his year-old Toshiba Corp. flat-screen TV was emitting an international distress signal picked up by a satellite, leading a search and rescue operation to his apartment in Corvallis, Oregon, 70 miles south of Portland.


The signal from Chris van Rossmann's TV was routed by satellite to the Air Force Rescue Center at Langley Air Base in Virginia.


On Oct. 2, the 20 year-old college student was visited at his apartment in the small university town by a contingent of local police, civil air patrol and search and rescue personnel.


"They'd never seen signal come that strong from a home appliance," said van Rossmann. "They were quite surprised. I think we all were."


Authorities had expected to find a boat or small plane with a malfunctioning transponder, the usual culprit in such incidents, emitting the 121.5 MHz frequency of the distress signal used internationally.


Van Rossmann said he was told to keep his TV off to avoid paying a $10,000 fine for "willingly broadcasting a false distress signal."


Toshiba contacted Rossmann and offered to provide him with a replacement set for free, he said

[Blazed]

:lol:

[brokend]

i have a radio that makes my dog paranoid. i think i should get repaid the $9.99 value of that radio, so my dog can rest easily. i think i can live without the police showing up at my house randomly, though. if the search and rescue came poking around, they'd discover the poorly concealed corpses i've, ahem, aquired over the years.... <_<

[fritoman]

we lived behind a radio station for awhile and had a cordless phone, the phone would pick up the radio station if you tilted your head just right...always made me paranoid that I would be talking and it would pick up my signal and send it out over the radio. :huh:

[GRITS]

I thought that sounded like you......you should be more careful what you say

[Wha?]

Especially when you're ordering take-out.

[FuzzyShoting]

we lived behind a radio station for awhile and had a cordless phone, the phone would pick up the radio station if you tilted your head just right...always made me paranoid that I would be talking and it would pick up my signal and send it out over the radio. :huh:

Then say things like bomb terror president, america. and you got it:P