Plane bad luck!

By Kath Gannaway
THE New South Wales owner of a model Canadair seaplane which went missing between Wesburn and Healesville is calling on locals to help him find it.
The bright yellow plane went missing on Saturday, 25 March.
“I’m hoping local residents may have noticed a UFO overhead at around 4pm in the southern Healesville area, which is about the time it went down,” said model-plane enthusiast David Brown.
Mr Brown, a veteran of model aeronautics for more than 30 years, had travelled 850 kilometres in 11 hours to take part in an invitation seaplane day at the Melbourne Radio Control Club at Wesburn.
He said the aircraft went missing after it stopped responding to his radio control unit and flew off into the distance and out of sight.
“We had been flying for eight or nine minutes and generally within half a kilometre of where you are standing is as far as they go,” he said.
“When it stops listening, for whatever reason, and does its own thing, normally it will crash just over there and you just go and get it.”
Mr Brown attributes the plane’s disappearance to putting too much petrol in the tank.
“There is no way of knowing where it has come to rest, especially if both motors stopped and it commenced a glide,” he said.
Still a little astounded at what he has labelled ‘unbelievable luck’, Mr Brown said it is only the third time in three decades of model-plane flying that a plane has gone missing.
He is pinning his hopes on getting the eye-catching plane back – in whatever condition – on bushwalkers, bike and horse riders or anyone else who may just happen to come upon it.
“It’s pretty much needle in a haystack stuff but you never know,” he said.
Mr Brown is offering a reward for the plane’s return and can be contacted on (02) 6353 1529.