Air Canada flight helps locate sailor off Australian coast

[scorpio77]

Hi all, can you believe this Air Canada Boeing 777 found this distressed sailor off the coast of Australia.
Anybody knows the singlehanded sailor, what a good luck that they found him.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/10/16/air-canada-australia-rescue-sailor.html

Regards everybody

 

[monkeybars]

Re: Air Canada flight helps locate sailor off Australian coa

Not really good luck, more like good technology,pilot was given gps coord, he simply dropped down to 6000 and told the passengers where to look and they confirmed there was a boat floating at that location, pretty straight forward if you ask me

 

[Lost Parent]

Re: Air Canada flight helps locate sailor off Australian coa

Don't make it sound such a little deal.
If you have flown over open ocean as much as I have {wife works for Air Canada} you would know that spotting a small boat on open seas is no easy feat even at that altitude .
I bet the sailor is thankfull as we all should be that there are people out there who are willing to help

 

[monkeybars]

Don't make it sound such a little deal.
If you have flown over open ocean as much as I have {wife works for Air Canada} you would know that spotting a small boat on open seas is no easy feat even at that altitude .
I bet the sailor is thankfull as we all should be that there are people out there who are willing to help

I'm sorry but it was no big deal,don't know if your familar with what GPS is but with an active signal from the sailors locator becon the pilot did nothing but punch those into the planes nav control and it took them to the correct spot +- 5feet. the only variable was cloud cover.I only have about 1200hrs as a gen aviation pilot but spotting a 35foot boat at one mile is very easy when you know exactly where the boat is and can put the sun at your back. This all was just a feel good media thing, I'm positive the pilot saw the boat before he ever did his public relations gimick for the passengers, the real heroes are the coast gaurd guys who go out in crappy wheather to do the actual pick-up of idiots like us who think we are black beard and are invincable.