Search and rescue gets "good experience" looking for false call

Two separate witnesses reported seeing a small plane go down on the Lyon County line between Carson City and Mound House around 4:30 p.m. Sunday.

Lyon County Sheriff's Search and Rescue took charge of the search, staging at Mound House Volunteer Fire Station number 36, and calling off the search at about 7:10 p.m.

"I don't think there was a crash," said Scott Burchett, commander of Lyon County Sheriff's Search and Rescue. "There's nothing out there."

A plane that landed at Carson City Airport within 20 minutes of the reported crash lead some searchers to figure that was the plane witnesses had seen.

"I think it was the plane that landed at Carson Airport. I think the people saw it go over the hill and thought it hit, when it just went down and landed at Carson," said Burchett.

Searchers used receivers that would have picked up a beacon from an Emergency Landing Transponder on the plane crash. Three search teams spread out on Linehan Road, Highway 50 and Redrock Road, then tried to triangulate on a signal. Search commanders in Moundhouse also monitored reports from the government's Global Positioning System satellites which would have picked up an emergency signal, and relayed the coordinates of the crash site.

"If they crashed, it should have set off the ELT, we should have got a hit off the satellite over an hour ago," said Burchett. "Basically, tonight was a good training mission."