Big air search stopped — survival ‘remote’

Press, 21 August 1978, Page 1

Big air search stopped — survival ‘remote’

The air search for the light aircraft and its four occupants missing in Fiordland since Tuesday has been called off. More than 28,000 square miles of some of the most rugged terrain in New Zealand has been covered from the air but no trace has been found of the plane or the four men. Search organisers believe the chances of finding the men still alive are now “pretty remote.” The missing men are the Rev. Syril Francis Crosbie, aged 37. of Riversdale; Trevor George Collins, aged 50, of Waimea; Gordon Grant Sutherland, aged 28, of Waipounamu; and Peter. Alexander Robertson, aged about 40, of Wendonside. In spite of snow . and high winds — nearly 2m of snow has fallen in the search area since the search began — ' military and private aircraft have flown more than 210 hours in an intensive search of the area in which the plane is thought to have crashed.

Snotv could easily have covered the aircraft, according to the search coordinator (Mr R. Rowe). “The search has been a saturation coverage of the area. Had there been any survivors of the crash, they certainly are not mobile/’ he said. However, the search, classified as a Class 3, is not over, although it has been scaled down drastically. Any sightings or possible sightings by aircraft or trampers w r ould be thoroughly investigated, said Mr Rowe.

Prospects looked good as late as yesterday after a report from an opossum hunter that he had seen a a blue and white plane, similar to the missing Cessna, late on Wednesday afternoon/ The hunter, Mr Kevin Hallett, saw the plane fly down the valley in the Lake Alabaster area, trying to get through the divide. It flew back along the valley towards the Olivine Plateau.

“It couldn’t get through"

there, and I heard it fly further north looking for another way out,” Mr Hallett said in Te Anau last evening. “It never had a hope in hell to get out. The cloud base was 1000 ft, and visi-

bility only five miles at the most.” Mr Hallett said he presumed the plane either found a way out further north, or landed at one of the many airstrips in the area.