By Philip Murray

A PLANE crash, dramatic search and phoenix-like rescue were all played out in miniature in the skies between Forfar and Kirriemuir earlier this week.

But those fearing disaster and loss of life can rest easy, for the plane in question belonged to a local model aircraft enthusiast and, astonishingly, its recovery owes more than a little debt to an equally tiny rescuer—courtesy of a kindred-spirit who takes aerial shots for a living.

Kirriemuir man Brian Patterson had given up his £180 miniature craft for lost after it succumbed to high winds and poor visibility in the skies over Horniecross towards the end of last week.

Within moments of it going down Mr Patterson and fellow Forfar Model Flying Club members embarked on an epic and “trying” search through boggy ground and thick vegetation in the hope of locating it—even resorting to using mirrors on poles in case the plane was stuck in bushes away from prying eyes.

However with no idea of its exact location, and with all options seemingly exhausted, all hope of its recovery soon disappeared.

But there was another twist to this tale, and one last option “waiting in the wings” which they hadn’t considered. When another local man, who runs a business taking digital shots of landmarks from the air, heard of Mr Patterson’s plight he embarked on an aerial search with a difference.

For this was no yellow Sea King helicopter on the prowl for a downed aircraft, but a miniature unmanned helicopter, which would more normally be seen photographing sites for the construction industry or assessing the condition of tall buildings.

Seizing the opportunity to give his search and rescue skills a test Mike Smith—who runs the Flying Scotscam aerial photo company—took his “quadrocopter” to the site and “three minutes” later had located the downed plane from the air using the miniature digital cameras strapped to the underside of his aircraft.

“We’d heard about the lost plane and where it was thought to be and I thought we could use the quadrocopter to take pictures from an elevated perspective,” said Mike.

“My company, the Flying Scotscam, does site overviews for the construction industry and close inspection at height—anywhere up to 100 feet.

“It was absolutely fantastic to find it. It took just three minutes to locate once we got airborne and showed up quite clearly—the white of the plane stood out against the green background— but it took us a bit longer to actually recover it because we had to get reference points on the ground.

“It was great to recover it though, as this was an unusual situation and was a chance to try it out on a new real-life task which we could use to experiment with ideas and some of our applications,” he added.

And Brian was delighted to see the “plane that got away” returned to him shortly afterwards.

“The group of us were out flying in pretty windy conditions and grey skies but I lost sight of it and when I picked it up again it was a white cross against grey and you couldn’t tell which way it was facing,” he said.

“The last I saw was it diving behind some trees in a location which looked relatively close but in fact turned out to be further away.

“When it was found, it was somewhere we’d have never seen from the ground. I’m very grateful to Mike and really appreciate what he has done—without him we’d never have found it.”

The aircraft’s recovery has ensured that Mr Patterson has a spare plane should one ever go missing again.

He had ordered a replacement in the days after his wayward miniature had disappeared—and it arrived the same day he got his original aircraft back

“The battery in the original is a write-off but the plane itself is made of a special foam which is strong—so it will fly again,” he said.

For Mr Smith, meanwhile, life has returned to the day-to-day running of his usual business, snapping buildings and construction sites from the air.

But he is always on the look-out for a new challenge to test his skills and even took to the skies soon after the spectacular Glengate Garage fire in Kirriemuir to see if he could snap the building without being in direct line-of-site—a feat he achieved with ease.

Who knows, maybe it won’t be too long before his “search and rescue” skills are called on again.