Public can join search for Fossett by scanning satellite images

The search for missing aviator Steve Fossett has gone public — at least for people with access to a computer.

Satellite images of the search area in western Nevada provided by DigitalGlobe, the company that supplies images to Google Earth, are now available online.

An aviation Web site, http://www.avweb.com, provides links to review fresh satellite images and instructions on how to look for Fossett's plane or any image that might resemble a small aircraft.

After being shown a satellite image, viewers will be asked to check one of two boxes.

One says the image "contains foreign objects that should be looked at more closely." Viewers then will be asked to describe them.

IHT

Rescuers resume search for adventurer Steve Fossett

The search for millionaire aviator Steve Fossett resumed on Wednesday with rescue planes scouring a rugged region of Nevada two days after a light plane piloted by the adventurer went missing.

A spokesman for the Nevada State Police said planes had set out at first light in an attempt to find Fossett, who took off from a private airstrip early Monday and has not been heard from since.

"The search is back on, and we've got several planes in the air already," the spokesman told AFP. "We expect to be flying throughout the day.

Fossett's family raised the alarm when the 63-year-old daredevil failed to return following his departure at around 9:00 am (1600 GMT) Monday in a single-engine Bellanca plane, Federal Aviation Administration officials said.

More than a dozen rescue planes scoured until late Tuesday the remote terrain that Fossett was believed to be flying over before he vanished, officials said.

However Fossett's failure to lodge a flight plan before take-off was complicating efforts to locate him, the FAA said.

Fossett made the first solo nonstop, non-refueled circumnavigation of the world in 67 hours in the Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer.

In 2002, he was the first person to fly solo around the world in a balloon.

AFP.com