SINGAPORE - The first scheduled passenger flight to Antarctica landed yesterday. The Australia/Hobart to the Australian Casey Station will fly weekly transporting public and scientists to the base.

The first scheduled Australian passenger flight, Airbus A319, left the Australian city of Hobart the previous evening, destined for the newly built Wilkins ice runway, 70 kilometres from the Australian Antarctic Division’s Casey Station.

Video on Reuters.com

I like the air-stewardess announcement “15 mins to landing - please put on your survival suits.”…. yes there’s no nice warm airport terminal to step into here!

-Robin-

(Image Credit: Reuters video still.)

LONDON, UK (Team Geared Up) - With a 60,000-square-mile search area (5hr radius from Flying Ranch M) to look for the missing world record breaker Steve Fossett they’ve decided it’s time to call in the technology. TGU Blogger Darran spotted today on TechCrunch.com that Richard Branson has asked Google for help in providing image analysis to locate him.

“I’m talking with friends at Google about seeing whether we can look at satellite images over the last four days to see whether they can see which direction he might have been flying and whether they can see any disturbances anywhere that they can pin from space,” –Branson

It would be hoped that by algorithmically comparing images taken before & after the incident a plane or debris could be determined on the ground. Even more successful would be an image taken during the flight time 5hr window which would capture the intact plane flying and his flight path could be determined.

Today a black hawk helicopter joined the SAR effort along with an interesting piece of tech. A ‘Gippsland Air Van’, plane complete with Archer multi-spectral imaging system that should distinguish Fossett’s plane from the background, flew in to join the effort. The system can detect a plane with just 10 percent of shape intact.

The following video has been shot flying over Flying Ranch M, Nevada. This gives an idea of terrain:

Steve Fossett tribute videos have started on YouTube already:

As a follow up to yesterday, it is now thought if he crashed into a lake the Emergency Locator Beacon could have been lost - this doesn’t yet explain his watch not signalling.

-Robin-

LONDON, UK (Team Geared Up) - This post is playing out all over the interenet, so I thought I’d try and add value to it rather than regurgitate.

At 9:00 am, on Monday, September 3, 2007, Fossett took off in a single-engine plane from a private air strip known as Flying M Ranch ( 38°36′39″N, 118°59′56″W), near Smith Valley, 30 miles south of Yerington, Nevada, near Carson City and the California border. He was allegedly performing a “ground recon” of dry lake beds for a land-speed in a car project he was involved with.

• Branson interviewed on BBC24 has said he gave him a present of a Breitling Watch which he never removes. This watch has a locator beacon in it and is easy to set off from a push of a button.
• The plane has an emergency locator beacon in it. This will activate if the plane crashes unless damaged in the crash (e.g. explosion). If landed safely Steve could set it off manually.
• The plane has full radio capability if it was landed safely with power remaining in batteries.
• Steve did not land at any other airfields and had a 4-5hr fuel range.
• Steve is highly experienced in piloting. “No better man” was the quote from SAR team leader.
• “Steve always pushes the envelope” said Branson.
• Steve was 63.

So it looks like - Steve may have had a heart attack mid-flight, or something similar. A bad explosion would wipe out the locator beacon. If this is not the case then he may have brought the plane down somewhere to check out the ground firmness for his speed record and be unable to relaunch - why he would have then lost the locator beacon (broken?) and the radio power is unknown.

CAP rescue currently have 13 planes in the air searching a grid formation for his plane or debris. They are currently treating this as a rescue operation rather than recovery. There is still hope.

TGU will post any updates we get.

-Robin-