No Sign Of Missing Plane That Vanished Over Olympic National Forest

QUEETS, WA — There are still no signs of a Tacoma pilot who went missing more than a week ago after his small plane disappeared from radar shortly following takeoff. Aerial search crews deployed again Tuesday over a large stretch of the Olympic National Forest, finding no clues pointing to Rod Collen or his missing Cessna T182 Turbo Skylane.

The Washington State Department of Transportation is charged with managing airborne search and rescue operations and shared initial details over the weekend — a few days into the search effort.

According to WSDOT, Collen left the Tacoma Narrows Airport shortly after 5:30 p.m. on Monday, March 6, and the plane's "Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast" (ADS-B) system either malfunctioned or was deactivated a few minutes later. Though the plane was invisible to standard tracking systems, officials said a radar forensics team was able to place the aircraft's last known position somewhere near the coast between Lake Quinault and Queets.

The last radar plots suggested the plane made a "very rapid descent to the ground."

Search teams have been unable to detect a signal from the aircraft's emergency locator transmitter since it left radar, but have narrowed the search to a 36-square-mile section of the forest. Officials believe the area where the plane went down is on tribal land near the Jefferson and Grays Harbor county line.

Snow on the ground has complicated search efforts from the air, and the woods are too rugged to search on the ground until a more specific area is identified.

Better weather Monday afternoon allowed aerial searches to resume with a state DNR helicopter, but crews reported nothing of significance after flying near Queets for several hours.

State search and rescue teams joined with volunteers Tuesday to fly two aircraft over the search area and again spotted no signs of an aircraft or a pilot. WSDOT said the Quinault Tribal Nation also flew a drone over the area but also failed to identify anything of significance.

Teams will be out again Wednesday and are optimistic that more good weather will prove helpful.

"Our Air Search and Rescue crews will again conduct aerial searches over the densely wooded forests near Queets on Wednesday, March 15, barring any changes to weather that would preclude safe flying operations," WSDOT said Tuesday evening. "Some snow smelt has occurred, which is positive news for air search crews as snow has been obscuring much of the search area."

>> More updates on the search will be posted daily on the WSDOT blog.