As the search for missing millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett entered its third day Wednesday, the disappearance of the highly skilled and experienced pilot, on a clear day in terrain familiar to him, continued to baffle rescue crews and aviation experts.
Fossett, 63, has not been seen or heard from since departing in a single-engine aircraft early Monday for a brief recreational jaunt from the Flying M Ranch in rural western Nevada. His wife, Peggy Fossett, was waiting at the ranch -- an exclusive retreat owned by hotel magnate William Barron Hilton -- for her husband to return by noon so they could leave the state on a private jet.
More than a dozen aircraft have been used to scour the dense, mountainous region about 90 miles south of Reno since the search began in earnest at 6 p.m. Monday, but so far there's been no indication of Fossett or the blue-and-white Citabria Super Decathlon he was flying.
"This is kind of strange because these aircrafts have transponders and emergency locators and you can usually readily find them anywhere in the world, including under the sea," said Ross Aimer, CEO of Aviation Experts, a San Clemente, California-based aviation consulting firm.
"This guy is totally lost.... So far, nobody's heard the electronic location beacon," said Aimer, who has flown the region several times. "That sounds to me very, very strange. There's all kinds of possibilities."
The unlikely disappearance has already spawned rampant speculation on the internet about possible conspiracies and government involvement, fueled in part by CNN journalist Miles O'Brien's on-air comments Tuesday that Fossett may have wandered into restricted airspace in the military's top-secret Area 51 or Nellis Air Force Base. As both sites are more than 300 miles from the search area, Maj. Cynthia S. Ryan, spokeswoman for the Civil Air Patrol Nevada Wing, called such notions "laughable."
Such disappearances aren't unheard of in these parts, a rough, hilly terrain of sagebrush, pine and dry lake beds, according to Ryan, who said the region's mountains are "full of plane wreckage that nobody's ever found."
Early Wednesday, searchers had a false alarm as they spotted something they were sure was Fossett's plane. It was not.
"We thought we had it nailed," said Ryan at a Wednesday afternoon press conference, describing elation in the command center upon spotting what rescuers thought was Fossett's plane.
"It turned out to be one of the many unmanned wreck sites from previous years," Ryan said. "(Rescuers) sent in a helicopter, put a man on the ground. They verified it was not Mr. Fossett or his aircraft."
Officials say there's been no detection of the emergency locator beacon that would automatically go off in the event of a crash or could have been enabled by Fossett himself if he were capable. Fossett did not file a flight plan and didn't carry extra radio equipment because he was only planning to be gone for a short while, Ryan said.
Fossett's wife of more than 30 years was believed to be in seclusion Wednesday at the Flying M Ranch, according to William Hasley, co-author of the 2006 memoir, Chasing the Wind: The Autobiography of Steve Fossett. The Fossetts have no children.
Fossett is a veteran aviator known for setting world records. In 2002, on his sixth try, he became the first person to fly solo around the world in a hot-air balloon.
He has an application pending with the federal Bureau of Land Management to allow him to try to break the land-speed record in a jet-powered race car in the northern Nevada desert sometime next year. Hasley and others have speculated that Fossett was scoping out dry lake beds to challenge that record.
Billionaire businessman Richard Branson, Fossett's close friend and frequent financial backer of his record-breaking efforts, told Reuters on Wednesday that he's asked contacts at Google to see if the company's satellite images can help in the search for Fossett.
Hasley called the disappearance and the inability to locate Fossett a "mind-blowing thing."
"I can't figure this out because it is a mountainous area but I think he was looking at the desert part of it," said Hasley, a Los Angeles-based author who last saw the missing aviator in July when Fossett was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in Dayton, Ohio.
Noting that Fossett sits on the executive board of the Boy Scouts of America, Hasley said, "I'm hopeful even if he did crash, he would be able to survive. He has unbelievable survival skills."
Hasley said if Fossett died amid a simple outing on a day with optimal conditions, it would be a cruel irony, considering his legacy.
"He's crashed all over the world in planes and balloons," said Hasley, who has not had contact with Peggy Fossett since the aviator went missing. "I would be very discouraged if he passed this way. But I'm not giving up hope."
Ryan was also optimistic.
"I can't think of anyone more experienced and capable of dealing with an emergency than Steve Fossett," she said. "The chances are still very, very good that we'll find this man."
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