Originally Posted by
Soundman101
A question for any ex-Nimrod guys on this thread, and forgive me if this has already come up but I'm not going to go through 8300 replies to find out!
It has, recently.
Watching the TV reports of the P-3's and others flying the search, some of the pictures seemed to show the aircraft flying pretty low, maybe 500' ish. This struck me a little odd in that unless you flew almost directly over an object you were cutting down everybody's field of vision and that a search from a higher altitude would let you see more area. This, I presume, would also limit a radar search. If the initial objects they were looking for were about 75' in length and possibly semi-submerged I would have thought a search from a higher level looking vertically down rather than horizontally would have made life easier and given more time for the searchers.
What were the recommended procedures when the UK had aircraft that could actually do this kind of thing.
First consideration is to stay below cloud.
A low radar look angle might be better at a longer range.
The media show the aircraft flying low - this makes good video. The aircraft may already have made faster passes at greater heights looking for the larger object - doesn't make good video.
For the small objects Dai Farr explained how they establish best range for a visual and radar detection and the height to fly.