DeLorme InReach now does weather

[Jackdaw]

DeLorme's InReach Satellite 2-way pager/tracker just got a LOT cooler. It now delivers on demand real-time and forecast weather for anywhere in the world. Off the grid. Readable on the SE device directly, or on an attached iOS device via bluetooth. No cost for the service, it simply takes one of your service packages monthly messages to retrieve. Totally sweet!

 

[kloudie1]

That is really interesting. I wonder if their marriage with Garmin had anything to do with that being offered?

 

[Jackdaw]

That is really interesting. I wonder if their marriage with Garmin had anything to do with that being offered?

Hey Claude,
Its a great deal. As for how it came about, I'm not sure. Before this specific offering the weather service was available, but as a simple text message reply. Now it come back to the Inreach as a compressed binary message that gets expanded to a lot more information. It's really a nice hack that benefits the user community.

 

[woodster]

Jack is this incorporated with the Garmin nave program on the chart plotter and visible on my plotter screen ...and if so will it come with and update for my plotter

i have a 541 Garmin

 

[kloudie1]

I am hoping the "SPOT" people follow suit. Their headquarters is a couple of miles away from my slip and I like to shop local..

 

[Skipper]

This is a breakthrough for budget offshore cruisers.
However, while I think it's cool, the reality is that I can get the same or better weather info on an iphone. Including radar, wind, currents, detailed forecasts etc., running the gamut of info available on the internet, with pinpoint location.
For free.
Or no additional cost past the phone plan.
Cell range is up to 15 or so miles offshore, which is about the average long range of a weekend day sail. Even going to Catalina am not out of range for but a couple hours till I hit the towers on the island. Anyway I checked weather before I left.
The sat weather requires an additional plan, if I'm not already using the DeLorme for other things. And it's not cheap. Even the basic flex plan has plan fees, gov fees, change fees, fee fees, etcetera. Minimum $200 a year for less weather info than I'm already getting for free.
Still neat. And no joke, when I cruise to Tahiti I'll be signing up immediately.

 

[Jackdaw]

Jack is this incorporated with the Garmin nave program on the chart plotter and visible on my plotter screen ...and if so will it come with and update for my plotter

i have a 541 Garmin

Yes, built into our plotter as well, XM-marine weather, at $30/month

 

[Jackdaw]

This is a breakthrough for budget offshore cruisers.
However, while I think it's cool, the reality is that I can get the same or better weather info on an iphone. Including radar, wind, currents, detailed forecasts etc., running the gamut of info available on the internet, with pinpoint location.
For free.
Or no additional cost past the phone plan.
Cell range is up to 15 or so miles offshore, which is about the average long range of a weekend day sail. Even going to Catalina am not out of range for but a couple hours till I hit the towers on the island. Anyway I checked weather before I left.
The sat weather requires an additional plan, if I'm not already using the DeLorme for other things. And it's not cheap. Even the basic flex plan has plan fees, gov fees, change fees, fee fees, etcetera. Minimum $200 a year for less weather info than I'm already getting for free.
Still neat. And no joke, when I cruise to Tahiti I'll be signing up immediately.

For sure, it has almost no value if you don't venture outside of cell coverage. When in cell range, all of the capabilities of the InReach are available via cell, usually as free services.

The entire value proposition of InReach is built around people that DO go outside cell coverage. A lot of my sailing is, and thats part of why I have one. The 2-way messaging capability is key for me staying in contact. The weather, tracking, and SOS feaures are nice as well.

 

[WayneH]

There is not much (none) cell coverage south of Venice, La. And we sail way south of that point so I got the InReach for the trips to Florida and back. It kept the kids informed of our progress and let them see we really weren't avoiding them. Maybe. OK OK we were.

But it really shined when I got an offer to crew from Mexico to Guatemala. Now I have the route mapped out and ready for my trip. Plus my wife flew down and met me in Guatemala and we traveled back north to Mexico. We decided to skip a spot on our itinerary and our friends texted us to ask what was wrong.

What sold us on the InReach was the two way texting. If some emergency occurs onshore, we can be notified almost instantly. We told the kids that although they could reach us by text, it might be 5 days before we could get into cell range. We are using one of the Freedom plans so we can turn it off when it's not necessary. Like last year when everything went against us and we didn't move the boat all year. I might have to reread the instructions for it this year.