Tim Holding Mountain Rescue
 

Herald Sun quote -

A private aircraft, not related to the search, spotted Mr Holding last night while he was wearing a headlamp given to him by his partner for his birthday last month.

Deputy Comissioner Kieran Walshe said he could not discuss the use of the aircraft because of security reasons.

The plane had spied a possible camp site overnight, narrowing the search area this morning.

A Victoria Police spokeswoman said the plane used was not a police plane but she could not comment further on the aircraft.

A police chopper winched the 37-year-old to safety from Mount Feathertop about 10am.


Any clues on the 'secret security sensitive' aircraft???

Heard the super secret security sensitive aircraft was a news helicopter!:ugh:

Yeah, I read it was the Ch7 chopper.

The helicopters were flying this morning, not last night.

Okay...Who found Timmy?
 

This is interesting...(my bolds)

Minister reunited with parents, partner after dramatic air rescue

:confused::confused::confused: WTF?

Could it have been the AMSA Dornier? Whatever it was it worked.:D

some reports said it was an AFP plane. do the AFP even operate aircraft?

There were reports it was Channel 7 chopper. Can't verify it.

That might explain the reluctance of the walloper to talk if his blokes didn't find the lost pollie.

P3. $40K an hour...Not to be used for every Tom, Dick or Harry.

So is he going to make a donation for his rescue?

Usually the pollies are the first to call for such a thing when someone is in the same position. Will be interesting to see what happens :cool:

The link quoted in post #1 now says:

Story around the traps last year was that the AFP was heavily modifying an aircraft for surveillance roles - rumour was it is a Grand Caravan and was decked out with some pretty high end FLIR and so on. I do know that the AFP were flight testing an aircraft as of mid-last year. Not out of the question to bring it down from Canberra (or wherever) for a bit of operational testing under the cover of darkness!

Why do that when the PAW has FLIR on the Dauphin ? .. or, at least, they used to have the installation ?

Wasn't that black and red Caravan that landed at YSSY yesterday was it? (probably wasn't but it had a great looking paint scheme)

Channel 9 News just stated that it was their chopper that spotted him!

This one?

Photos: Cessna 208 Caravan I Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

Isn't that Black Toyota's van out of Toowoomba?

No expense spared

http://www.airlockinc.com/assets/images/SR71.jpg

It's the Harold Holt retrieval squadron running a little over budget, and a tad late:E

Pity they found him now I cant use this old joke.

What do you call 1 dead pollie? .....A good start

maybe 'biggles' authorised another pig flight?

Maybe it was Ben Buckley :)

I reckon they will all say they found Timmy.

That way no-one knows who DID find him as then we would have someone to BLAME!

Another political cover up!!!! I mean, a lost politician, who WANTS to find one of those................

Maybe it was Ben Buckley

Some "chance"!:)

Jack

PS Sorry - couldn't help it - love that expression ....:ok:

"Joe" the cameraman!

I heard the pilot of the helicopter interviewed on ABC Newsradio today at about 4pm. He said the missing person was waving to them on the ground. He didn't mention anything about using sophisticated spy technology .. just hand waving! LOL!

Here's the interview.

The plot thickens - to again quote the HS -

What type of plane was it that spotted Victorian Water Minister Tim Holding stranded in the Victorian Alps?

In a statement on their website this morning the Victorian Police stated that an Australian Federal Police plane had spotted a light from Holding’s makeshift camp.

Yet this afternoon Victorian police have contacted news organisations telling them to remove any reference to the plane being an AFP plane with the reference taken out of the media release . What is going on here and who owns this plane?

According to the original statement on the police media website an AFP plane located a possible camp site overnight.

The possible site gave searchers a narrowed-down area to investigate this morning.

A camera from the Victoria Police helicopter confirmed Mr Holding’s position on the mountain.

But fVictorian Police have now contacted media outlets telling them to take out a mention of the AFP plane for “security reasons.”

So if it is an AFP plane and why all the secrecy? Well The Punch can find no mention in the AFP’s annual report that they have a plane, so if they do have a plane it doesn’t appear to be on the public record.

Of course the plane may not be owned by the AFP at all.

It could be an Air Force plane, but then why not just come out and say it was an airforce plane unless it was an Air Force plane we’re not supposed to know about.

At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, we could be talking about another Commonwealth organisation that owns planes and doesn’t talk about it - say one of our spy organisations.

The point here is not whether the plane should have been used in locating Mr Holding, obviously any way they could have found him is a good way.

The question is why can’t we know about it given that we’ve funded the search? And secondly, would the same plane be used if you or I were lost in the bush? Is this a plane brought out for Ministers who manage to get lost in the bush.

ELB???
 

Without sounding 'Sour Grapes'......

"I'm going for walk, and I may be gone some time".....

I wonder if this 'Experienced hiker' has ever heard of an ELB?

Could have been all over in a couple of hours.....
Imagine the anguish that may have saved his family.:}

And, yep! For the 'nockers'.....I have two, one for the boat, and one for the
4WD, which is small enough to carry on a 'hike'.

Cheers:ok::ok:

Just imagine.....
If the silly little man had an ELB in his top pocket......

Could have saved his family a lot of anguish....and been 'over' in a couple of hours??

:}

Holding Spotted by Aircraft
 

Anyone know what aircraft was used to trace the missing Minister at night? As far as I know no conventional aircraft could fly over the area due to weather. Can satellites detect tiny lights or body heat? Could aircraft like fighter jets or Orions etc go slow enough to detect a single human? Would love to know what is possible.

I don't know about military, but the lowest you can go down at night is the lowest safe altitude which is 1000 ft above the highest spot height/obstacle in the vicinity.

Anyway glad to hear he's well. I was up on Feathertop a month ago for a few days by myself (although with my iceaxe!) It's a beautiful - almost spiritual -place to be alone in winter. Good to see people getting out there and glad the issue of the cost of his rescue is not making waves here as it has in many other areas. Probably 'cos rescuing people keeps a lot of people here in a job!

Holding Rescue
 

Yeah - I have no issue whatsoever with the cost of his rescue - that's why we have technology, and what price can you put on human life anyway?

But I do have an issue with being treated like a school kid by the official channels. If it was a spy plane, the authorities should tell us. We're grown-ups. We can handle it.

And if resources were deployed that normally would not be, again, tell us. Say it was justified because of his importance to the government. We might not agree, but so be it. But don't pretend it didn't happen, or that it was a private aircraft. Just tell the truth.

Channel 9 claimed their chopper found him. Even had an interview with their chopper pilot... with nice labels all over the screen "first at 9" blabla...

lame

Maybe this phantom aircraft aircraft is like the ones that you see at Las Vegas that fly to the non-existent area-51 with their fake rego's. I sense a conspiracy.

With regard to the weather, I suspect it cleared up at night enough for a fixed wing but choppers generally don't do S&R at night except for Polair and the big twins and there isn't many of those around those parts.

Yeah it was reported first off as being an AFP aircraft, then Vic Police media requested media outlets withdraw the "AFP" bit and the aircraft became a private aircraft... and then it became a C7 Chopper... and now its a C9 Chopper!!


Perhaps it is some AFP skullduggery... Nice caravan anyway.

Your mixing it all up - the aircraft noone wants to talk about that supposedly located his torchlight was last night.

The "discovery" of him this morning (ie confirmed sighting him) is variously claimed by several media outlets.

It's getting interesting....

What kind of plane spied Tim Holding last night? | Article | The Punch

;)

Lateral thinking..it could have even been a DSE aircraft with IR firespotting gear.....however, the little snippet of the light shining inside a tent is a bit of a giveaway to something more sophisticated.

Anyway...the guy did good. If he was lost above the snow line the first thing to do is get below it and hunker down for the night...in his case two nights. Those extra few degrees of temp make a world of difference...

Hey Stalllie....I thought you would have got enough of that icy solitude in your day job:}