How hard will they look when your plane goes missing?

[Widow]

From the April 16, 2002 SENATE DEBATES


SEARCH AND RESCUE
COORDINATION BETWEEN AGENCIES
TO IMPROVE METHODS
Hon. Gerry St. Germain: Honourable senators, I rise today to
bring to the attention of the Senate the request and suggestion
that the time has come to once again review our search and rescue
capabilities in this country. I will briefly recount an unfortunate
aviation accident that occurred in British Columbia.
On March 2, 2000, pilot and World War II veteran pilot Herb
Brown departed the Langley airport on a short flight to
Chilliwack, B.C., a flight that normally took 30 minutes. The
plane encountered bad weather, and it disappeared. Later that
day, Mr. Brown and his plane were reported missing. Search and
rescue forces searched for six days but did not find a trace of the
plane.
The case was turned over to the local police and filed as a
missing persons case. With no positive search results,
Mr. Brown’s son, Ron Brown, a retired Vancouver police
officer, realized that the only way his father would be found
was by continuing the search on behalf of the family, himself. The
Vancouver Province summed up the efforts of Ron Brown as
follows:
In July 2002, after a month-long battle with
NAVCANADA, Ron Brown finally got his hands on the
tape recordings of his father’s final words to the control
tower and of the ELT transmission from the downed
airplane.
After careful analysis of the tapes, the search area was
narrowed down considerably and thousands of leaflets were
distributed to homes in the target area. Shortly thereafter,
on September 2 last year, some residents who had seen the
leaflets found the plane on a hillside near a trail.
Honourable senators, I left out much of the detail of the
17-month search for Herb Brown. I have raised the case because
something needs to be done. We must review how search and
rescue activities are done in this country. In this case,
NAVCANADA refused to hand over the voice and ELT tapes
for the searches by the RCMP and Mr. Brown.
The Transportation Safety Board only gets involved once a
plane is found. It is not involved during the active search or
investigation. The National Search and Rescue Secretariat,
Transport Canada, NAVCAN, TSB and the RCMP are not to
blame. Each agency followed its procedures.
I do not believe a lack of financial resources is the culprit either.
Ron Brown spent $20,000 to find his father. The search and
rescue effort cost taxpayers $1.2 million. Mr. Brown approached
me with many concerns relating to the lack of investigative
experience of the agencies involved in the search. In this case, key
evidence was avoided and not questioned. Expert examination of
the tapes was not undertaken.
Honourable senators, a message must be sent to the
government to better coordinate the current agencies or to
create a comprehensive integrated agency that uses all available
resources and sees each search and rescue effort through to a
proper conclusion. I believe that the Standing Senate Committee
on Transport and Communications should consider, at the
earliest opportunity, means to improve the search and
investigative methods used in search and rescue exercises in this
country.

http://www.parl.gc.ca/37/1/parlbus/cham ... 4-16-E.pdf

Knowing that Search and Rescue officials paid no regard to witnesses who claimed to have heard the plane crash on February 28, 2005, one suspects nobody has done anything to forward this cause. At what cost?

[32a]

"... better coordinate the current agencies ... create a comprehensive integrated agency... improve the search and investigative methods ..."

Ma'am, with all due respect, do you know that Canada has one of the best SAR organizations in the world? There is incredible coordination amongst numerous agencies, and they're always striving to improve the system - even without prompting from the senate.

"How hard will they look when your plane goes missing?"

As one of the SAR pilots searching on 28 Feb, I assure you all these agencies and people were doing their best.

That others may live.

[Widow]

"... better coordinate the current agencies ... create a comprehensive integrated agency... improve the search and investigative methods ..."

Ma'am, with all due respect, do you know that Canada has one of the best SAR organizations in the world? There is incredible coordination amongst numerous agencies, and they're always striving to improve the system - even without prompting from the senate.

"How hard will they look when your plane goes missing?"

As one of the SAR pilots searching on 28 Feb, I assure you all these agencies and people were doing their best.

That others may live.

I most certainly meant no disrespect to any of the people actually working the searches. But if no-one tells you where to look (ELT transmission, witness, voice recordings "I'm looking at the ground here" says the pilot, etc.), then you are going to come up empty handed too often. Did you know that at about 9am on March 1st witnesses began calling to say they had heard a plane making rough noises AND crash between Quadra and Cortez at about 10.15 the previous morning? I have the Log. My husbands' backpack was turned over the same day. With all the reports that came in that day, why weren't the search efforts concentrated to the specific area before my husband's body was found the next afternoon? Heck, the HMCS Whitehorse came TWICE, and still didn't check the right area, despite family members circling it on the map. It may be true that no-one would have been found alive by then, but it would have saved those involved - including SARTEC - an awful lot of heartache. Not to mention first what must have been millions of taxpayer dollars, and as much as a $100,000 from the families.

This other pilot, who went missing and whose family had to take over the search wrote this "The SAR people willingly opened their records and said if they had a tape of my father speaking they would have provided me with this tape since I was now the expert in my father’s search and conceivably the only one actively looking for my father. During this visit to SAR at xxx where all the records are kept I was also told that if I wanted to obtain any tape from Nav Canada I should prepare myself to deal with some different types of people. Also the SAR people told me they welcome my perusal of the records because they don’t want to look like they were hiding anything. This would prove to be a refreshing statement compared to my later experience with Nav Canada. They wished me luck in extracting anything from Nav Canada."

After exhausting other official resources, this 30-year police veteran approached the RCMP officer in charge of the missing persons case and enlisted his aid.

I asked him if he would request the tapes from Nav Canada as part of his investigation. He soon got back with me and told me that they all turned him down. He said he had phoned xxx airport, xxx airport and xxx airport and they all told him, “no”. He said, “Obviously the red surge (Uniform) doesn’t mean anything these days”.

In the end, it seemed only because he approached the media that NavCan gave up the tapes. "In all it took me approximately four months to pressure Nav Canada to hand over the tapes. What they were holding onto was the most important information of all. My father was not in the areas that Search and Rescue and the volunteers had searched. He met his demise west of the entire search area."

Now does that sound like the agencies were co-ordinated?

[32a]

Ma'am, Nav Canada data including voice and RADAR tapes, RCMP referring witnessess, Air Defence information, Public radio/newspaper announcements requesting witnesses, and countless other information sources are all key factors in major searches coordinated by one of three Canadian Joint Rescue Coordination Centres or appointed Search Masters. During a search, the cooperation amongst all the various agencies is excellent.

In the Campbell River search, how witness information that you mentioned did not get to the search coordinators - ships and aircraft searching the wrong area? - sure sounds like the witnesses were not talking to responsible people.

In the other search, I can not speak about the release of information but I believe there was (then) an unfamiliar concept of radio signal localization being used. That method has since been added to the SAR bag of tricks.

Joint Rescue Coordination Centres are responsible for the coordination of all air and maritime searches in Canada, and they have existed for a long, long time.

[Widow]

- sure sounds like the witnesses were not talking to responsible people

Sir, I have the Incident Log V2005-00353 released under Access to Information sitting in front of me.

From March 1st logs :"VAC=recieved a call from xxx who= he was rowing yesterday off Rebecca Spit towing salvaged logs, from 930-1100. H heard a loud roaring engine and a bang, He was about 1/2 way down Rebecca Spit on the outside and the sound came from the East or Southeast of him."

"=call from xxx Quadra Island who = he heard an aircraft iht the water yesterday North of Rebecca Spit, between Quadra and Cortes Islands"

"=Approx. 10:00 yesterday he was working on his V/I in Drew Hbr. Wx. was poor Vis. He heard what wounded like an A/C trying to power out of something - heard a loud sound (crash?) then heard nothing. It came from the Rebecca Spit area - low altitude and not far off shore" (this person actually called the airline first and was told that it couldn't have been AQW as it was not in that area)

"=xxx he heard an aircraft on the Water Monday morning, doing a low/high rev of the engine near Little main lake and Clear Lake area. He did not see aircraft because of fog and did not see it take off."

Since these reports are logged with date and time, I don't think you can pass this off as witnesses "not talking to responsible people". (I'd be happy to supply them to you, if that will help you believe me.) Rather, someone failed to co-ordinate the information and get everyone searching the right area instead of all the way to Frances Bay, Knights Inlet etc. Even after the body was found, they still did not search the whole area between Quadra and Cortes, only the Quadra shoreline.

[32a]

Now you have really peaked my curiousity. Which agency's log are you quoting?

[Expat]

I worked on a few searches, as pilot, navigator, and deputy searchmaster. We were not succesfull in most cases, where there was no electrnic signal.
The philosophy behind the rapid searches is first to save lives. When there are cooperating survivors, the rate of success of a search is very high. Normally, after four days, the chances that there are still survivors becomes negligible. The urgency of the search is definitely not the same.
As for the search itself, it is always carried out according to established and practised procedures. The nature of the forest cover in Canada makes it very hard to spot a wreckage. I have seen pictures taken directly above a downed plane, and could not see it! Now imagine going at 110 Km/h and scanning half a mile distance. The chances in that case are very low. In a forest cover, we estimate a 5% chance of finding a wreck. We had an airliner that went missing for some 25 years, a few miles from Vancouver!
The searchmaster normally receives a lot of sighting reports. Most of them are false, but we take no chance, and map them and carry out additionnal scans with helicopters. It does not mean that they will find anything because there was a report. If it is invisible from the air, they will still not find it.
Like we say in SAR, the most important is to save lives. The quest for closing a case after the estimated survival period is of secondary importance. The same principle applies when someone is washed overboard from a ship. The ship crew will search for a few hours, depending on sea conditions, and survivability factors.
It normally takes more than a day to set up a search headquarters that can start an organized seach, and accept sighting reports.
This must be taken into account.
This is why we stress the importance of using a beacon, especially the new type that broadcast a numerical signal with GPS derived position.
Hope it helps understand the nature and constraints of SAR work.

[Hedley]

We were not succesfull in most cases, where there was no electrnic signal

That's because you didn't want to pick up a guy wearing a thong and drinking a martini!

[Doc]

Most of the time, I'm on an IFR in a twin turbine. But if I were slogging around in a single, I'd have a hand held GPS, and a Sat phone safely stored in a Pelican case....so, if I were still "kicking" they'd hear from me real quick!

[Widow]

Most of the time, I'm on an IFR in a twin turbine. But if I were slogging around in a single, I'd have a hand held GPS, and a Sat phone safely stored in a Pelican case....so, if I were still "kicking" they'd hear from me real quick!

If there's no time to grab a life jacket, there's no time to grab the sat phone. I still don't get why AIRPLANEs don't all have GPS by now.

FYI the request for Access to Information to DND and Fisheries and Oceans (Coast Guard) were combined by the AIP department due to overlapping documentation. The Incident Log, however, appears to be that of the Coast Guard (JRCC).

[the_professor]

Most of the time, I'm on an IFR in a twin turbine. But if I were slogging around in a single, I'd have a hand held GPS, and a Sat phone safely stored in a Pelican case....so, if I were still "kicking" they'd hear from me real quick!

IFR in a twin turbine means....? Any multitude of factors, however unlikely, could have you putting down somewhere out in the boonies. If we lose you off radar at 15,000', what's your potential glide distance? A 30nm radius? What's the surface area of a circle with a 30nm radius? That's a huge potential search area to be considered. I'd say everyone should have that equip on board, regardless of type.

[the_professor]

This other pilot, who went missing and whose family had to take over the search wrote this "The SAR people willingly opened their records and said if they had a tape of my father speaking they would have provided me with this tape since I was now the expert in my father’s search and conceivably the only one actively looking for my father. During this visit to SAR at xxx where all the records are kept I was also told that if I wanted to obtain any tape from Nav Canada I should prepare myself to deal with some different types of people. Also the SAR people told me they welcome my perusal of the records because they don’t want to look like they were hiding anything. This would prove to be a refreshing statement compared to my later experience with Nav Canada. They wished me luck in extracting anything from Nav Canada."

Why would Nav Canada be so resistant to releasing the tapes? How does the legislation regarding disseminating radio signals to the public factor in to this case?

[Expat]

With a functioning beacon, weather permitting, the SAR Tech will jump on the site the first day of the search.

[Doc]

Well prof, with all due respect, how many twin turbine aircraft do you lose off radar? And if/when that happens, how many times would it really matter anyway? Life is a numbers game. Maybe we should all stay home?

[Brewguy]

...If there's no time to grab a life jacket, there's no time to grab the sat phone. I still don't get why AIRPLANEs don't all have GPS by now...

Sorry Widow, but I don't think this is likely to happen. Every piece of equipment added into a new airplane adds to the cost, which the buyer whines about. And if anyone were to try to make it mandatory for older aircraft to add this equipment, the backlash from the owners would be immense.

As an example, take a look at all the fuss both industry and private owners made about the phasing out of 121.5 MHz (and military 243 MHz) ELTs in favour of the newer 406 MHz ones. Just wait and see how much of a stink the media will make when an a/c carrying a working 121.5 ELT crashes ... but COSPAS/SARSAT doesn't find it because it's no longer supported, and people die as a result!

There are one heck of a lot of poorly equipped private a/c out there, and the pilots & owners are as much to blame for that as anyone. Heck, trip on out to your local grass-strip airfield, and you're likely to see a barn full of old a/c that still don't carry radios.

Source: www.sarsat.noaa.gov
ELTs were the first emergency beacons developed and most U.S. civil aircraft are required to carry them. ELTs were intended for use on the 121.5 MHz frequency to alert aircraft flying overhead. Obviously, a major limitation to these is that another aircraft must be within range and listening to 121.5 MHz to receive the signal. One of the reasons the Cospas-Sarsat system was developed was to provide a better receiving source for these signals. Another reason was to provide location data for each activation (something that overflying aircraft were unable to do).

Different types of ELTs are currently in use. There are approximately 170,000 of the older generation 121.5 MHz ELTs in service. Unfortunately, these have proven to be highly ineffective. They have a 97% false alarm rate, activate properly in only 12% of crashes, and provide no identification data. In order to fix this problem 406 MHz ELTs were developed to work specifically with the Cospas-Sarsat system. These ELTs dramatically reduce the false alert impact on SAR resources, have a higher accident survivability success rate, and decrease the time required to reach accident victims by an average of 6 hours.

Presently, most aircraft operators are mandated to carry an ELT and have the option to choose between either a 121.5 MHz ELT or a 406 MHz ELT. The Federal Aviation Administration has studied the issue of mandating carriage of 406 MHz ELTs. The study indicates that 134 extra lives and millions of dollars in SAR resources could be saved per year. The only problem is that 406 MHz ELTs currently cost about $1,500 and 121.5 MHz ELTs cost around $500. It's easy to see one reason for the cost differential when you look at the numbers.However, no one can argue the importance of 406 MHz ELTs and the significant advantages they hold.

Due to the obvious advantages of 406 MHz beacons and the significant disadvantages to the older 121.5 MHz beacons, the International Cospas-Sarsat Program have made a decision to phaseout 121.5 MHz satellite alerting on February 1st, 2009. All pilots are highly encouraged both by NOAA and by the FAA to consider making the switch to 406!

[Widow]

Why would Nav Canada be so resistant to releasing the tapes? How does the legislation regarding disseminating radio signals to the public factor in to this case?

"The Information Commissioner (Canada) took the Transport Safety Board and Nav Canada to Supreme Court for refusing to disclose information that they had had been originally in the hands of Nav Canada. Nav Canada handed over digital documentation and other information to the Transport Safety Board. Another body wanted this information from the Transport Safety Board but Nav Canada said they couldn't because it is the property of Nav Canada.

...talked to Transport Canada and they said that they even have difficulty sometimes getting information from Nav Canada and others even though Nav Canada was once part of their mandate. Transport Canada used to run the control towers and they conveniently passed this job off to a bunch of people that call themselves a Not for profit agency. Remember ... that COPA sits on the board of Nav Canada. This then makes them a private agency resulting that no citizen can get information from them under the Access to information Act because they are not listed under the act. ... Transport Canada has done this to escape liability and anyone seeking evidence will be stonewalled.

The court case lasted for quite a while and the Judge eventually ruled against the Information Commissioner. However, the last I heard they were appealing the decision.

I think we should all be concerned about this decision that is basically against all the citizens of Canada. The information contained in these documents are the property of Canadian citizens. The agencies are essentially paid for by Canadians but no citizen of Canada is allowed to see the details. Should you want to, as a family member, see all the details and every bit of evidence the doors will quickly slam shut.

Apparently the preparations for this pending court case had commenced prior ... accident and it explains why I was having so much difficulty with Nav Canada and others. In United States everyone has access to information from airplane accidents right down to hearing tapes of their loved ones. However, they cannot utilize the information for lawsuits. At least that is what was explained to me by a member of AOPA (American Owner Pilots Association). In Canada we have to perform cart wheels to get the basic information."

[Cat Driver]

Widow, I am amazed at what you have accomplished.

I finally ran out of steam after spending about a year being run around in circles by arguably the most insulting department in TC " Quality Assurance " ( Insulting to any Canadian citizen )

For anyone who thinks TC is working in the best intrest of the public I urge you to try and get " Quality Assurance " to give you even a hint of doing what their mandate is.

Makes the Mafia look real honest.

Cat

[Widow]

We'll be on global tomorrow

[the_professor]

Transport Canada used to run the control towers and they conveniently passed this job off to a bunch of people that call themselves a Not for profit agency. Remember ... that COPA sits on the board of Nav Canada. This then makes them a private agency resulting that no citizen can get information from them under the Access to information Act because they are not listed under the act. ... Transport Canada has done this to escape liability and anyone seeking evidence will be stonewalled.

Whoa, whoa whoa.

First of all, TC used to run the entire ANS -- towers, ACCs, FSS, and all the associated hardware that goes with it.

Please tell me you are not suggesting that the motivation for creating Nav Canada ten years ago was to allow Transport to escape liability when an accident happens?

[xsbank]

The BC Forest Service used to have a network of radio repeaters all across the province but it decided they were too expensive to maintain. Now all of the tankers and birddogs (and contract aircraft/helicopters) have sat phones, hooked up through the a/c audio boxes. No reason why every floatplane can't have one too.

[Cat Driver]

Be very careful here widow.

Don't get drawn into arguments that will not be advantagous to your end goal.

Ignore the bait from the_professor, you may get dragged into an argument that will end up hurting your original agenda.

Cat

[sky's the limit]

The BC Forest Service used to have a network of radio repeaters all across the province but it decided they were too expensive to maintain. Now all of the tankers and birddogs (and contract aircraft/helicopters) have sat phones, hooked up through the a/c audio boxes. No reason why every floatplane can't have one too.

Forest Service still has the repeater network, used it two days ago. We use it any time we fly for foresty, that includes fires, Timber Sales etc, etc.

STL

[the_professor]

Be very careful here widow.

Don't get drawn into arguments that will not be advantagous to your end goal.

Ignore the bait from the_professor, you may get dragged into an argument that will end up hurting your original agenda.

Cat

No baiting here. Just making sure that I was mis-reading that post. Suggesting that the privitization of the ANS is somehow related to TC attempting to escape liability would be a ludicrous suggestion entertained only by the most deluded of conspiracy theorists.

[angry inch]

Currently, globalstar service is intermittent, at best.. Don't know about Iridium. Surely this will be remedied in the future, but 'til then... and yes, the repeaters still provide an excellent comm network..

Not all operators get to enjoy some of those nice "sugar tit" BCFS contracts during the fire season to pay for expensive equipment like hard wired sat phones:) hehe

[Widow]

Be very careful here widow.

Don't get drawn into arguments that will not be advantagous to your end goal.

Ignore the bait from the_professor, you may get dragged into an argument that will end up hurting your original agenda.

Cat

No baiting here. Just making sure that I was mis-reading that post. Suggesting that the privitization of the ANS is somehow related to TC attempting to escape liability would be a ludicrous suggestion entertained only by the most deluded of conspiracy theorists.

If you look at the post, you will see everything is in quotation marks. This is because that is what was told to me.

You asked Why would Nav Canada be so resistant to releasing the tapes? How does the legislation regarding disseminating radio signals to the public factor in to this case?

I gave you the answer that was given to me. I don't know much about Nav Can, our aircraft wasn't on the radio waves. We don't think. Maybe I should request the Nav Can tapes, just to be sure.