Baggage to the rescue
 

Reports of floating wreckage, eskies, fishng rods and baggage washed ashore at dusk near Gladstone (Australia). Authorities suspected a capsised fishing boat.

A bag label gave details which, when checked, revealed that the owner was travelling in an Aircraft.

SAR was mobilsed and round midnight located a half sunk A/C and then found two people lying on the beach nearby, who have been taken to hospital in a serious condition.

Report on ABC news as follows


.Washed-up luggage leads emergency services to injured men in crashed helicopter


Two men seriously injured when their helicopter crashed in waters off the central Queensland coast have been saved after their luggage began washing up on a nearby beach, sparking a search and rescue operation.
Police said they started searching for what they initially thought was a capsized boat after eskies, luggage and fishing rods started washing up on beaches near Gladstone on Saturday afternoon.
Just after midnight, the RACQ rescue 300 helicopter found a helicopter partially submerged off Curtis Island, and discovered two injured men, aged 61 and 56, lying on the beach.


Senior Sergeant Robyn Taylor-Ward said the label on one of the men's bags may have saved their lives.Senior Sergeant Taylor-Ward said the men were in serious conditions.
"They obviously rendered first aid and the men were then transported to Rockhampton Base Hospital," she said.

Reports suggest they went down Friday Afternoon, and didn't get found till 12am this morning. Very lucky they did not come in contact with the local resident crocs.

http://i68.tinypic.com/23sx65e.jpg

OzRunways posted this on Facebook this morning:-

Great news this morning! Last night just before 8 pm we got a call from AMSA and were quickly able to find the tracking information for this flight, which ended in what looked like a normal approach to a sandbar. Unfortunately, the landing didn't go as planned and the two men managed to get themselves out and on to the beach but without being able to reach their PLB. When the SAR team was re-tasked to the coordinates we supplied, they quickly located the critically injured survivors, after 36 hours on the beach.

It goes to show the value of having a SIM in your iPad; Just $50/year prepaid from Telstra could save your life one day!

There's a "P" in PLB for a reason.

It lives in your trouser pocket to locate you. Not much good in the aircraft behind a seat.

Easy to say now Compressor, don't be too harsh, I'm sure we're all guilty of it from time to time, though we shouldn't be. Also a bit harsh without knowing the circumstances, it could very well have been in one of their pockets and got loose during their exit.

Always a timely reminder though to everyone using PLBs to keep them close at all times as you'll never know when you might need it.

And Ozrunways is indeed awesome! haha.

the only flaw with PLB's is that you have to be able to activate them, hard to when it gets knocked off your person by impact forces, or your unconscious or worse, apps like Ozrunways Avplan or things like Spot tracker leave a trail for rescuers to follow even if your incapacitated.

A halyard helps.......

To put it up the mast? 😉

Lanyard would be more useful

from the Rotoheads forum

1. SAR cancelled moments before the engine flamed out and a botched auto rotation resulted in the crash.

Thread drift on premature SAR cancelling about to start - apologies