According to a press release from the West Virginia Wing of the Civil Air Patrol, the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center at Tyndall Air Force Base, Fla., alerted state CAP Sunday, Nov. 29, about an aircraft that was reported missing after it departed from a Texas airport on Nov. 23.

The male pilot and his aircraft, a Piper PA-30 twin engine, took off from Dalhart Municipal Airport near Dalhart, Texas, and was flying to Virginia. The pilot did not file a flight plan, but CAP has information as to the flight path of the aircraft, and will be searching a high probability area in Southern West Virginia.

Six CAP aircraft from the West Virginia Wing flew missions all day Sunday. Three aircraft are expected to conduct search missions Tuesday, Dec. 1, depending on the weather. State CAP Ground Teams from Beckley and Charleston will work with an E-Team from the West Virginia Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Services.

A CAP aircraft with the Airborne Real-time Cueing Hyperspectral Enhanced Reconnaissance, or ARCHER, system from the Pennsylvania Wing of Civil Air Patrol has also been alerted, and will arrive Tuesday morning at the North Central West Virginia Regional Airport in Bridgeport.

Hyperspectral imaging in an aerial application allows an operator to program into an on board computer the “spectral signature” of an object. A sensitive HSI camera on board can then detect and pinpoint any object on the ground that match the signature.

The HSI sensor is also capable of detecting anomalies, objects significantly different from the background in which they are located, as well as change detection, detecting changes over time through a pixel-by-pixel comparison. Data on possible “hits” that match the spectral signature, anomalies, or changes can be processed in real-time, stored and analyzed, and transmitted to ground teams.

Civil Air Patrol, the official auxiliary of the U.S. Air Force, is a nonprofit organization with 58,000 members nationwide. CAP, in its Air Force auxiliary role, performs 90 percent of continental U.S. inland search and rescue missions as tasked by the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center and was credited by the AFRCC with saving 72 lives in fiscal year 2009.

Its volunteers also perform homeland security, disaster relief and counter-drug missions at the request of federal, state and local agencies. The members play a leading role in aerospace education and serve as mentors to more than 23,000 young people currently participating in CAP cadet programs. CAP has been performing missions for America for 68 years.