Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Webcam Saves Man Stranded On Sea Ice

Posted by samzenpus on from the out-to-sea dept.

siloko writes "A German walker, stranded on sea ice after abandoning the beach in favor of a better picture of the sunset, has been saved after flashes from his camera were spotted by a tourist webcam viewer hundreds of miles away. After darkness fell over the seaside town of St Peter-Ording, the walker became disoriented and couldn't locate the coast. In desperation, the walker, who hasn't been named, started using his camera flash to attract attention, which was noticed by a woman watching a webcam of the area. She notified the police, who located the man and escorted him to safety."

12 comments

  1. BS by j00r0m4nc3r · · Score: 1

    I'm gonna call BS on this. This lady was watching a webcam of a coastal area at nighttime? Why would you do that? And saw a flash 100+ miles away, and based on this decides to call the police? The local police then scour the ice and find this guy who is 100+ miles away? There is either a piece of information missing here, or this is not a completely honest story. Or I'm just horribly cynical.

    1. Re:BS by v1 · · Score: 1

      I think it depends on why she called the police. She might have been a UFO nut or something that wa really freaked out by the light which is why she called. I don't think she realized who or what it was. The police she called however, may have been aware of the missing person, put the facts together, and took a chance on it.

      --
      I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
    2. Re:BS by graffic · · Score: 1

      Also the lady understood that a flash "far away" was something unusual for that webcam. This means that our lady was an "addict" of that video feed and was able to understand in a blink what is usual and what is not usual.

    3. Re:BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      I believe you're missing something. She was hundreds of miles away watching a stream from a webcam which was relatively close to the stranded tourist. As for why there's a webcam of the area, I'd guess it's for seal watching or something similar. Nothing all that bizarre or strange.

    4. Re:BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Keep in mind that on average 5 hikers will die tonight because no one will watch the darkness of the web cam feed where they are lost. This story is not so unusual when you consider that statistic.

    5. Re:BS by Bigbutt · · Score: 1

      The article said it was a popular place to get pictures of the sunset. Likely it's the same reason the webcam was up especially since she was watching the sunset as well.

      Since it's popular, according to the police there are several incidents of tourists going out onto the ice to get those sunset pictures and getting disoriented and missing the shore, especially as it was covered in snow.

      Carl

      --
      Shit better not happen!
    6. Re:BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It is therefore everybody's duty as a human being to spend several hours each night watching dark webcam feeds looking for stray flashes of light.

    7. Re:BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm gonna call BS on this. This lady was watching a webcam of a coastal area at nighttime? Why would you do that? And saw a flash 100+ miles away, and based on this decides to call the police? The local police then scour the ice and find this guy who is 100+ miles away? There is either a piece of information missing here, or this is not a completely honest story. Or I'm just horribly cynical.

      Use your head.

      She was looking at a webcam that was located 100 miles away. Why? -- who cares? I've hit the link on a webcam pointed at Mt. St. Helens at night. So what?

      Then she called the police local to where the webcam was, not her own local police.

      People like you are a pain in the butt -- you just can't believe anything you haven't experienced yourself.

      I'm an amateur radio operator. One morning while I was talking to a few others, someone broke in with a request to have someone call 911 about an accident he'd just seen happen on the freeway. He'd have called it in himself, but he'd forgotten his cellphone at home.

      When someone took responsibility for making the 911 call, he came back to report to the driver that he'd done so. He also related the time he'd had to waste explaining why the driver hadn't made the call himself. The 911 dispatcher had to be convinced that it was possible that someone was driving around with a means of communications other than a cellphone.

      Similarly, another operator had a system in his car (APRS -- google it) which continually reported the car's location as taken from a GPS unit. When the car was stolen, he called the police with an exact description of the car's location, speed and direction.

      Naturally the dumbass cops were ready to come out and arrest him for filing a false report. They just couldn't believe that someone could do what the guy was claiming. The old "I've never heard of anything like that" brand of ignorance.

  2. doubtful by w1gglyw0rld · · Score: 1

    Given the curvature of the earth, can you see 100+ miles? No.

    1. Re:doubtful by bughunter · · Score: 1

      Um. No.

      For an observer at 6ft from sea level, the distance to the horizon is 3.25 miles.

      If you want to see a distance of 100 miles, then you need an altitude of 6660 feet.

      More detail here

      --
      I can see the fnords!
    2. Re:doubtful by lakin · · Score: 1

      Not just by myself. But a webcam combined with this new thing called the internet can span those 100+ miles. The webcam was in the same area as the tourist, the viewer was hundreds of kilometres away.

      --
      Paul
    3. Re:doubtful by w1gglyw0rld · · Score: 1

      Oh, I get it. The WEB-CAM was within a reasonable distance of the wayward photographer, not the VIEWER OF the web-cam. If that's the case, I stand corrected.