Very sorry to hear of their robbery, yet in a way fortunate to not have incurred physical injuries, albeit such robbery AND invasion incidences and particularly an attempted rape always invoke significant psychological
distress.
Ditto for burglaries but to a lesser degree as to the feeling of loss or violation of your safe space.
The stolen and inadvertently activated
emergency position-indicating
radio beacon (EPIRB) did its job but since it was transmitting from a land location such notification becomes bureaucratically confusing and hence snafued. Likely most everyone would just assume that it was an inadvertent activation. As to the lack of response to their Pan Pan, that is interesting as to why, others did not reply on the channel. If the nature of the Pan Pan which was being transmitted included a statement of the nature of "urgency" such that the other vessels understood that there had been an incident but that the situation was in the past and not the present then I perceive that there would not be much of a motivation for replying as there would not be anything they would be in need of doing or capable of being of assistance. If the Pan Pan indicated continued urgency of distress or
medical injury that needed attention then there should have been response if the message was in fact received AND understood. Do recognize that the Pan Pan may have been issued in a non-native language, such as
English and not understood by locals, or on a non-monitored channel. I
recall a business associate calling emergency services when we were in
Germany to report an auto
accident on the Autobahn. He spoke American
English and the dispatch operator did not, a complete failure of communication resulted. While we were tending to
medical first aid, fortunately a local German stopped and made a call to 999 and emergency services were dispatched with little delay.
The radiotelephony message PAN-PAN is the international standard urgency signal that someone aboard a boat, ship, aircraft, or other vehicle uses to declare that they have a situation that is urgent, but for the time being, does not pose an immediate
danger to anyone's life or to the vessel itself. This is referred to as a state of urgency. This is distinct from a mayday call (distress signal), which means that there is imminent
danger to life or to the continued viability of the vessel itself. Radioing pan-pan informs potential rescuers (including emergency services and other craft in the area) that an urgent problem exists, whereas mayday calls on them to drop all other activities and immediately begin a
rescue.
I
recall the time I was robbed when on a business trip to Chicago, before cell phones and thus calling emergency services via a nearby pay
phone, the emergency services operator's first question was: "What is the nature of your emergency?" To which I responded: "The nature of my emergency WAS, not IS" and then I proceeded to explain that I had been robbed on the street while waiting for a taxi to arrive. My call to emergency services being about what had happened and not about what is happening thus not rising to the nature of a May Day, or a Pan Pan. Since the robbery was no longer in progress and the perpetrators had left and I was not physically harmed, i.e., the SITREP [situation report] being NOT an emergency or an urgency, "we" [the emergency services operator / dispatcher and I] made arrangements for the police to be dispatched to the
hotel I was staying at instead of the location from where I was calling in to report the robbery as that would be more convenient for me and a safer
environment. About an hour later, after returning to my
hotel, the police arrived to take a statement, although we all knew that it was "a done and done incident" and likely nothing would come of the reporting, unless they were able to trace back to an attempt to use one of my credit cards, which I made arrangements to have cancelled and a new American Express card issued and delivered the following day.
Once a robbery or intimidating crime is completed and there is no continuation of force or threat of force or violence or invoking of fear, nor injury, it becomes an incident that is much like
water in your wake. You gather yourself as best as you can and progress on. Sometimes it can be beneficial to receive some counseling to
work through your emotions and regain yourself. Kind of like being unexpectedly knocked down by harsh
weather or waves when sailing, you rebound onto your
keel [assuming your not on a Cat] and you continue sailing, perhaps with a deeper reefing and eased
sheets, or go hove to so as to calm the situation, restore the boat and stabilize yourself and the crew.
Similarly, I have had friends and business associates robbed, it was distressing especially in the moment, and inconveniencing subsequently. Afterwards, they were like: "Okay, that was an unexpected, unpleasantry."
While one can often influence but generally can't control the attitudes or actions of others, or of many adverse life
events [accidents, disasters, hazardous incidents], realize that one always should endeavor to have full control over how you react and you respond to such occurrences. That was a key lesson learned early on in my life from my father, a military officer of resolute bearing.
In that regard, I recall a police man taking a statement from me regarding an intimidating incident and he noted that I was remarkably calm. I replied that calm was not a word that I would use to describe the status of my disposition rather composed would be a more accurate assessment.
To put this incidence in reference to a comparison of crime statistics, granted these are land based data from the
USA where robberies are not unusual
Definition
The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program defines robbery as the taking or attempting to take anything of value from the care, custody, or control of a person or persons by force or threat of force or violence and/or by putting the victim in fear.
Overview
There were an estimated 319,356 robberies nationwide in 2017. The estimated number of robberies decreased 4.0 percent from the 2016 estimate and decreased 7.5 percent from the 2013 estimate. The 2017 estimate was down 28.0 percent from the 2008 estimate.
The estimated robbery rate of 98.0 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2017 showed a decrease of 4.7 percent when compared with the 2016 rate.
In 2017, the average dollar value of property stolen per reported robbery was $1,373. Robberies accounted for an estimated $438 million in losses. Banks experienced the highest average dollar loss at $3,483 per offense.
Among the robberies for which the UCR Program received weapon information in 2017, strong-arm tactics were used in 41.5 percent, firearms in 40.6 percent, and knives or cutting
instruments in 8.1 percent. Other dangerous weapons were used in 9.8 percent of robberies in 2017. The
USA having a "gun culture" the presence and use of firearms being quite common. IMHO, too often.
Re: Armed robbery in Panama
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