Now let’s switch gears from emergency beacon technology to what it’s like to actually use one. Picture yourself as the professional skipper/manager of a beautifully-built 2008 Atlantic 57 sailing cat well along on a recent delivery from the Chesapeake to St. Martin. You’re in t-shirt-and-shorts-at-night weather now, though blustery, and during your evening watch you’ve depowered the sail plan a bit more so that a mate can finish making dinner.

But suddenly roaring out of the dark comes what was likely a tornadic waterspout that lifts and flips the whole catamaran so quickly you don’t even have time to reach the autopilot standby control, leaving the three of you to deal with an instantly upside-down world of water-filled main cabin, escape hatches, ditch bags and worry. Finally put yourself on the cat’s slippery bottom in the USCG thermal video (though of course its very existence is very good news).