We have to plan for the worst – harbour master
THE search efforts for the missing aircraft were resumed at 8am today, aided by better weather conditions.
Channel Islands Air Search and a French rescue helicopter based in Cherbourg were first to do a sweep of the area.
By the middle of the morning, more than 1,000sq. miles had been searched by a total of five aircraft and two lifeboats.
Despite these efforts, there was still no sign of the missing aircraft, nor a raft.
Due to the lack of crash evidence, UK authorities had been calling airfields on the south coast to see if it had landed there.
Harbour master Captain David Barker said it was hard to say if anything would be found.
‘We don’t know what the two people in the aircraft were wearing, but I doubt very much they were wearing survival gear,’ he said.
‘The water temperature is just above 10 degrees at the moment and that doesn’t give you very long until you start to freeze.
‘We will continue certainly until the hours of darkness tonight and we will have to think very hard on how we continue from then on.’
Captain Barker added that a remarkable number of assets had volunteered to help with the operations.
‘We just carry on searching and hopefully we find something. I will be delighted if we get a call saying they are safe and well ashore somewhere,’ he said.
‘But we have to plan for the worst.’
Late today, one aircraft and one lifeboat were still searching the area and another plane re-joined after refilling. The search was stopped at nightfall.
Vessel tracking websites showed that the Alderney lifeboat, Roy Barker I, was focusing its search efforts near the Casquets lighthouse for much of the day.
Although in the latter part of the afternoon it began searching in a much smaller area about nine nautical miles north-west of the island.
Despite finding some debris in the water, it was decide to suspend operations until daylight tomorrow morning.
