A dropped phone on Mount Pisgah set off a false possible Plane Crash alert Monday afternoon, pulling police and fire crews from more than a dozen agencies into a fast-moving search near Lake Willoughby.
The response gathered at the South End Trailhead and quickly expanded. The Vermont Division of Fire and Safety and Vermont State Police used drones, a nearby National Guard helicopter joined the effort, and the hospital in Newport was put on alert as crews worked to sort out whether there was an actual aircraft emergency.
Nathan Handy said the alert came from a hiker’s phone after it fell off a cliff, but the person who dropped it did not realize what had happened because there was no service. That missing signal mattered because it left responders with a warning that sounded urgent and a caller who could not immediately explain it. In situations like this, a device can send an automatic emergency notification even when no one intends to make one, which is why false alerts can pull in a response as large as the one seen here. Similar aviation emergencies have drawn intense attention before, including a Plane Crash in the Bahamas and another in France, but this one turned out to be a false alarm.
Handy said the hikers finally got service in Lyndonville and called back to report they were fine, there was no emergency, and they were never in a plane. That closed the loop on a Monday afternoon response that had already tied up drones, a helicopter, and a wide network of crews across the area. The unanswered piece is how the phone managed to send the alert after being dropped, and that is the part that will matter the next time a device, not a witness, is the first thing to ask for help.
