Residents could be forgiven for thinking a major drama was unfolding on Wednesday night last week when a South Care Helicopter scanned the township and bay for over an hour with a powerful searchlight.
The airborne search surprised more than a few residents before the craft landed at Snug Cove to conserve fuel.
One resident was riding his pushbike up Cattle Bay Road about 8pm when the chopper swept over him with its 320 million candlelight spotlight.
A certain journalist was pyjama clad and standing at her lounge room window on the phone to concerned relatives when she too was blasted by the light.
When the chopper landed, a crowd of about 15 residents gathered in the cold conditions as the rescue team, aboard was ex Eden resident Damien Relf, attempted to locate the source of an EPRIB signal.
A distress signal from an EPIRB (Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon), a safety device for marine craft, had been activated somewhere in the local vicinity, prompting the Australian Maritime Safety Authority to dispatch the $7 million dollar helicopter to investigate.
The EPIRB was located in a vessel at a house owned by South East Fibre Exports adjacent to the chip mill, located between the SEFE mill and the naval ammunitions wharf.
The pilot and crew of four reported that the analog signal on the 121.5 frequency was confused possibly due Eden's hilly topography, and two crew members explored Snug Cove on foot and by car with hand held antenna to try to hone in on the signal.
Just before 10pm the crew travelled by car to East Boyd Bay where the signal was strongest, and confirmed it to be a false alarm.
Only one local fishing boat, the trawler Rubicon, was not in port that night and an early call confirmed its safety.
However the boat's computer had picked up an EPIRB signal further out which was later confirmed to be an echo.
A spokesperson from AMSA said the costly exercise highlighted the need for maritime operators to update their EPRIBs to the newer digital 406 which can narrow a signal's source to within 60 metres.
He said the 121 EPIRBs would become unusable in February 2009.
"We are registering four to five hundred a day," he said.
Once the 406s are in place, emergency services will be able to see who the device was registered to and have a list of contact phone numbers to call.
It's likely that when an accidental signal occurs, such as the one last week, that the only cost involved will be a few a phone calls.
At $5300 an hour just for the helicopter, it was a costly scenic flight.
While the search continued, the paramedic aboard the South Care helicopter, Phil McHugh, stayed with the craft and was very accommodating with interested onlookers and their many questions about the craft and rescue operations.
Eden youngster Morgan Hartley was treated to an excellent demonstration of the winch and a sit in the helicopter.
The crowd also received regular updates of the progress of the deciding State of Origin match by mobile phone and a collective groan went up at the game's unhappy conclusion.
See www.amsa.gov.au for more information on digital and analog EPRIBs.
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