Forced to use an unfamiliar beacon

I was also surprised just how many snomo-skiers there were are up there.  I've never seen any other skiers where I normally go (Cle Elum/Teanaway area).

BTW - Where's the trip report?  Interested to see where they dropped you.

Yea me too. Convinced me I need to get a snowmobile. See lift skiing thread for TR

You won't regret getting a sled. Feel free to PM me if you want suggestions/beta.

thanks

The really dumb thing was that our concerns were met with the suggestion we wear their trackers but carry our own in our packs to use in a search. They even encouraged me to use my beacon in their beacon array.
So that'd be an increased chance of a searchers beacon being left on and of a beacon in a loose pack being mistaken for a victim.

That sounds truly bizarre.
I've had it both ways (supplied my own, and used theirs). My 2 bits is that these days technology and ease of use with beacons would suggest that using a brand new tech beacon should be a piece of cake* with any of them. Given this "fact" I would suggest that the heli or cat operator is well within their right to ask you to use theirs. They've no idea how you've treated your beacon. T'would take too much time to check everyone's battery strength, model (frequency, type, out-dated-ness of technology), beacon condition. Haven't I read somewhere that using different model beacons (obviously they need to be of the same frequency, but even if they were both digital) sometimes can lead to incompatibility issues?
Scotty, you do raise some very good points BUT I think these points were much more valid 15 years ago, when technology made it more time consuming for us to find buried beacons, there was no "erase mark" for multiple burials, and it was critical that you spent lots and lots of time getting to know your beacon. Not to say that you shouldn't be bomber with it nowadays, just that it takes less practice to find burials faster these days.

* I realize that in a real accident there is no "piece of cake".