Air Canada flight helps locate sailor off Australian coast

Air Canada 777 diverts for ocean search. Bonus entertainment for passengers. I guess all is well that ends well.

Australian authorities are thanking the crew of an Air Canada flight for helping to locate a sailor in distress off the country's east coast.
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) said Tuesday it received an emergency beacon activation at 8:15 a.m. local time, coming from approximately 270 nautical miles (500 kilometres) east of Sydney.

The AMSA requested Air Canada Flight AC033, a Boeing 777 en route from Vancouver to Sydney with 270 passengers and 18 crew aboard, to divert to the area of the beacon.

"The location of the beacon was within a flight path, so we needed to assess the situation and the Boeing 777 was the closest asset available to us," Jo Meehan of the AMSA told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.

...

"Almost right away, my first officer spotted something," Robertson said, adding that at 5,000 feet is was hard to make out any details.

"So I went from 5,000 down to 3,700 feet ... and they saw what they thought initially were three people on the deck, but it turns out there was only one," he said.

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Crap, this was several years ago. I checked more links and found a date. Probably old to members here.

a reply to: roadgravel

It happens to all of us. Still a great story.

a reply to: roadgravel

Nevertheless an interesting thread....

thanks

I thought it was a bit unusual. I think I would have been OK with the experience as a passenger. Cool travel story.

I agree, still a cool story though and not one I can recall hearing of previously.

That's a big piece of equipment to be doing SAR.

a reply to: roadgravel

You might like this one.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: roadgravel

You might like this one.

That was quite interesting. It's remarkable what people can do in times of need. Right people, right place, right time.

a reply to: roadgravel

Perhaps it is a bit of an old story, but they should get that crew back together again to go search for MH370.

Just keep them supplied with beer: and they'll never give-up.

a reply to: Zaphod58
That was an excellent story full of luck and ingenuity, and frankly although I lived through it I had long since forgotten it. I was going to talk about another scenario that happened in the Tasman sea a few years later which didn't end well, as it was an example of bureaucratic incompetence and cover up. But I would rather celebrate this kind of dogmatic "never give up" story. Funny thing was as I read the beginning I immediately remembered the Mt Erebus crash, I vividly remember it.

Other than two less than pleasant landings, I have no cool commercial flight stories. However this would be a great place for ATS members to post a good story if they got one.

I don't criticise the pilots for not so fun landings since I have no clue what they were facing at the time. Both were in obvious crosswinds. My one and only Reno landing was so bad I never routed though that airport again.

a reply to: gariac

My coolest story isn't all that much, but the way it went down was pretty memorable (to me anyway)...

Flying into MIA one morning the pilot came on the intercom and casually said...

"Good morning ladies and gentlemen from the flight deck. It's a sunny 82 degrees on the ground in Miami this morning. As we make our approach into MIA I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for flying the friendly skies with us on United. ... Oh, and for those of you on the left side of the aircraft, if you look out your windows the Space Shuttle Endeavor is about to lift off from Cape Canaveral in about 25 seconds or so. ... From our family to yours, thanks again for flying with us on United, we should be on the ground in about 15 minutes."

It was just that casual, just an 'oh by the way' reference. I looked out the widow and watched Endeavor lift off and streak toward the heavens. When Endeavor went out of sight I looked back inside...every single person was crowded over onto the left side of the cabin.