On Wednesday of last week (the 14th) I caught Kiwi Air's Reims/Cessna 406 ZK-XLF on a brief visit to Auckland. There was some speculation that it was leaving the country and given that it headed to Lord Howe Island this seemed feasible. However an article on www.stuff.co.nz today reveals its on a search and hopefully rescue mission...
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A privately funded New Zealand search plane will this afternoon fly to an area in the Tasman Sea where dozens of people have reported seeing what they believe is a life-raft possibly from the missing American yacht Nina. The 85-year-old Nina left Opua, in the Bay of Islands, on May 29 bound for Newcastle, Australia, with seven people aboard. It was last heard from on June 4, when conditions in the Tasman were very rough, but searching only began on June 25. The official search was called off on July 4 with no trace of the Nina or its crew found. But families in the United States have continued to fund private searches and, for the first time in this part of the world, used a crowd sourcing tool to explore hundreds of satellite pictures. The Tomnod system gets people to identify unusual objects they see in high-resolution satellite photos. Most of the 56,000 photos show nothing more than waves, a grey sea and cloud - but one picture spotted by an undisclosed number of people, has a bright orange object in it. Nina carried a bright orange life-raft. The object is between Norfolk Island and New South Wales. A Facebook page set up by crew families says they have raised enough money to hire a twin-engine Cessna F406 owned by Gisborne based Kiwi Air Ltd.
To see the full article go to : http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/9057259/NZ-plane-checking-out-Tasman-Sea-life-raft
To see the Facebook page go to : https://www.facebook.com/ninarescue
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