I found the line "the plane's emergency locator beacon had been left at home" was rather odd since a plane's ELT is typically a permanent installation. It is mounted rigidly to the airframe because it is designed to sense the G-loads in the event of a crash and automatically activate itself. I leave mine mounted in my plane and know of no one who regularly takes theirs out. And if I had taken it out, I would have been sure to reinstall it since it is a FAA required piece of equipment if you are flying more than 25 miles from your home airport. <img src="images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Otherwise, I think he was well prepared mentally and equipment wise. The only additional piece of equipment I would suggest would be a portable GPS unit. I have a portable aviation GPS which is my main navigation device, keeping me on course but would also pinpoint my exact location if I was downed somewhere. Those coordinates could be radioed to the search team speeding up the rescue.

More Crash details: http://www.aero-news.net/