When millionaire Steve Fossett’s plane went missing over the Nevada range in 2007, the swashbuckling adventurer had already been the subject of two prior emergency rescue operations thousands of miles apart. Know more:
Balloonist Steve Fossett is retrieved by a US Coast Guard helicopter from waters 10-15 miles north of the island of Oahu in the Hawaiian Islands on December 25, 1998, after abandoning his quest along with Per Lindstrand of Sweden, and British mogul Richard Branson, who were attempting to make the first nonstop round-the-world flight in a balloon.
“There are many people who are going to say, ‘Why should the society spend money on the rescue effort if [these people] are wealthy enough to be able to…engage in these risky activities?’” While the Coast Guard’s cost for the mission is likely to run into the millions of dollars, it is generally prohibited by federal law from collecting reimbursement related to any search or rescue service, said Stephen Koerting, a US attorney in Maine who specializes in maritime law.
The demand for those resources was spotlighted in 1998 when Fossett’s attempt to circle the globe in a hot air balloon ended with a plunge into the ocean 500 miles off Australia. The Royal Australian Air Force dispatched a Hercules C-130 transport aircraft to find him. A French military plane dropped a 15-man life raft to Fossett before he was picked up by a passing yacht.
Some places have laws commonly referred to as “stupid motorist laws,” in which drivers are forced to foot the emergency response bill when they ignore barricades on submerged roads. Arizona has such a law, and Volusia County in Florida, home to Daytona, enacted similar legislation this week. The idea of a similar “stupid hiker law” is a regularly debated item in Arizona as well, with so many unprepared people needing to be rescued in stifling triple-digit heat.
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