I was trying to give them the benefit of the doubt even though I was all over this back when it happened. We see she had on a properly inflated life vest so somewhere along the way, someone either made a mistake or it was switched out. It couldn’t have been switched until she was on the rescue helicopter, not while surrounded by the other passengers.
http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/24246422/exclusive-pilot-describes-discovering-molokai-plane-crash
“Lang also claims they “contacted the Moloka’i tower for clearance just before 3:30 p.m. Wednesday. They say the tower operator asked if they were able to hear an “ELT” or Emergency Locator Transmitter.” But when they landed at the airport 5 minutes later, there was no one around. IOW, there was at least one person in the tower who knew there had been a crash but disappeared from the scene within moments. Who called the Coast Guard and the fire department?”
And then #201 - “Especially weird since the CG was notified of the crash at 3:27 (which would make the report of departure of 3:15 rather than the scheduled 3:35 more in line) be some time after the crash) and the airport wasn’t supposed to close until 3:30. Makes you wonder just when the airport personnel closed up or if they had bothered showing up for work that day. Also makes you wonder if Fuddy had chartered the plane and Kawasaki had hung around all day and if he left the plane unattended.”
3:15 was the departure time listed on the manifest, and although Schuman, the airline owner and Army veteran, told various media outlets the crash happened at 3:15, 3:30, 3:45 and “ten minutes into the flight”, I have to favor 3:22 as the time of the crash, as two passengers’ cheap watches, both showed that time far later into the scenario aftermath.
What is the significance of #201, by the way?
The 3:15 flight was a regularly scheduled flight, subsidized to keep passenger ticket prices down and somewhat affordable for the tourists. I believe the pilot normally waits around between the morning and afternoon flight, but being an 18,000+ hour pilot, this particular flight’s pilot, who also had been Schuman Air’s Director of Operations, would have been a more expensive lay-over than most freshly-minted, building-time-for-the-majors flight instructor-types.
The Molokai Tower operator, who was some 8 miles to the west southwest of Kalaupapa heard reports of an ELT and checked with the first-on-the-scene pilot, Josh Lang. His girlfriend was reportedly first to spy the craft on the water.
That got radioed back to the Molokai Tower operator, who send up the alarm via the FAA’s Honolulu Control Facility. There is no reason to believe that operator disappeared from the scene before the normal end of his shift.