Last summer, while flying over the largest wilderness in the lower 48 states, I heard a radio call: "Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. White Cessna... [broken and inaudible transmission]." I heard just enough to understand something bad was happening, but not where. I repeatedly tried to hail the aircraft to get them to repeat their location, to no avail. My attempts, however, did pique the curiosity of other aircraft on the backcountry frequency, all of which were south of my position. None of them had heard the call. I deduced the distressed aircraft must have come from somewhere north of my position, so I turned to head upriver where the most likely airstrips were and tuned to 121.5 MHz to listen for an ELT.
展开▼
