Wreckage of plane missing since 1997 found in Michigan

[96gs917]

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/07/1...lieved-to-belong-to-couple-that-vanished.html

Here's the link.

I'm not sure if anyone remembers this...I sure don't.

Striking that they couldn't locate this plane at the time.

 

[denverpilot]

The famous density altitude VHS video of the crash of an L-19 Bird Dog here in the Rockies wasn’t found for years. The tape was scattered all over the crash site and painstakingly placed back on reels and the video extracted from it, showing the aircraft owner and pilot, and his grandson, perishing. It was years after they crashed and weren’t found.

Hikers or snowmobile folks come across most of our “unfound” wrecks out here, eventually.

 

[Mike Smith]

I wonder how many “unfound” wrecks there are in CONUS?

 

[eman1200]

It’s probably equal to the amount of flights with no flight plans filed.

 

[Brad Smith]

The article makes no mention of any bodies found or clothing or any useful info. Is there enough remains to do a DNA test? Perhaps the couple wanted to disappear and arranged the whole thing. A little more information would be helpful.

 

[Dan Thomas]

The article makes no mention of any bodies found or clothing or any useful info. Is there enough remains to do a DNA test? Perhaps the couple wanted to disappear and arranged the whole thing. A little more information would be helpful.

Sometimes there is nothing left. Animals and bugs can completely eradicate bodies, and weather can do a lot, too. If you spend time in the bush you very seldom see any bones or other remains of animals. A crash that occurred in the forest near my hometown in the 1970s resulted in three fatalities, but it wasn't found for several years. There wasn't much left beyond belt buckles and such.

 

[Skywalker]

This was big in they Detroit news... According to the reports the issue was that they looked in the wrong area. The assumption was that they took more or less the direct route back home. They however got of track and the plane was finally found in an area that had never been searched.

 

[Clip4]

Just glad they had an ELT.

 

[jesse]

I wonder how many “unfound” wrecks there are in CONUS?

Quite a few. The search for Steve Fosset first found like eight other missing aircraft before ever finding his.

 

[GRG55]

Sometimes there is nothing left. Animals and bugs can completely eradicate bodies, and weather can do a lot, too. If you spend time in the bush you very seldom see any bones or other remains of animals. A crash that occurred in the forest near my hometown in the 1970s resulted in three fatalities, but it wasn't found for several years. There wasn't much left beyond belt buckles and such.

The desert camouflages, the forest covers and the mountains just swallow little planes whole.

Took more than a year before Steve Fawcett's plane wreckage was found, and that only after a hiker came across two pieces of identification about a kilometre from the crash site. Only some bone fragments left at the crash site itself.

Friend of mine flying his V-tail over the northern boreal forest disappeared more than 30 years ago; no trace of him or the plane since.

 

[GRG55]

Quite a few. The search for Steve Fosset first found like eight other missing aircraft before ever finding his.

I believe the total was six. And all of them were confirmed as previously discovered and identified. The media love to dramatise, and "OMG look at all these other crashed airplanes they are finding" probably sells advertising.

 

[AKBill]

A father and son had been missing for about 10 years here in the Juneau area. A hunter/hiker found the wreckage earlier this year. A lot of us locals spent many hours searching for them. The forest swallowed the plane up.
edit: it was a sad story, family camping trip. They had to much gear and had to make two trips to the camp site. MVFR weather the wreck occurred on the return of the second trip.

 

[Old97]

There was an article in, i think, outside magazine. There is a group dedicated to finding all missing planes in the US. I cant find the link now.

 

[wrbix]

Any missing planes originating in Colombia?
Just curious.

 

[woodchucker]

Just glad they had an ELT.

I’m still trying to figure out the purpose of this post?

 

[Clip4]

I’m still trying to figure out the purpose of this post?

Because their Congressionally mandated ELT was worthless.

 

[ChrisK]

I spent a week looking for that plane. I was part of the team that made contact with the Mackinac County sheriff and searched St Ignace. Long time ago that was.

The search area was gigantic. Containment was basically the eastern UP all the way down past Mio. It would have taken some luck to find anything given all that space to cover.

 

[Anymouse]

It’s probably equal to the amount of flights with no flight plans filed.

I guess I have a few thousand wrecks that I've left out there. No wonder flying is so expensive!!

 

[TipTanks]

Weird article. They say nothing about if there are any remains (I realize there may not be), but whats with the black and white picture? It was 97 not 37.

 

[kgruber]

Quite a few. The search for Steve Fosset first found like eight other missing aircraft before ever finding his.

And he wasn't found by any "search." Just hikers out on the trail.

 

[Zeldman]

Animals are usually the first responders to a crash in the bush.

That is why I refuse to take BBQ sauce, wet nap moist towelettes and toothpicks together on the same plane......

 

[ARFlyer]

I helped search for a local Forestry guy who wasn't found till several weeks later by shear luck.

Another guy wasn't found for a week after he crashed on climb out from a local airport. They found the wreckage in the woods just past the runway. None of the trees were damaged nor could you see the wrackage from the air or ground.

This was in the middle of a city to!

 

[j1b3h0]

20-odd years ago California was suffering from yet another 6 or 7 year drought. Calivaris reservior dried up to the point where I revealed an ill-fated Mooney, missing since 1961!

 

[woodchucker]

Because their Congressionally mandated ELT was worthless.

Gotcha. Thanks for clarifying. I didn’t realize how low the odds are of them actually working are ... around 12% in one article I just looked at.

I always figured that it’s just best to be prepared for the worst case scenario, that if you go down you are on your own regardless.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

I didn’t realize how low the odds are of them actually working are ... around 12% in one article I just looked at.

That is quite low. Confirms to me the desirability of also having a PLB in your pocket on long cross-countries over remote areas.

 

[aftCG]

I wonder how many “unfound” wrecks there are in CONUS?

For a real eye opener, do a search for the CONUS broken arrow map. You would think it would be harder to screw up and lose a nuke

 

[Lachlan]

The desert camouflages, the forest covers and the mountains just swallow little planes whole.

Gordon Lightfoot, is that you?

 

[GRG55]

Gordon Lightfoot, is that you?

I think he was more into the wrecks of ships named after Irishmen.

 

[Jim_R]

Weird article. They say nothing about if there are any remains (I realize there may not be), but whats with the black and white picture? It was 97 not 37.

A black and white photo makes it weird? It's just a copy of the photo that ran in the dead-tree newspaper when the plane disappeared. They still had those in 1997, and they were black-and-white.