Pilot practising mayday prompts false alarm

A student pilot practising a mayday call put emergency services through their paces yesterday when he mistakenly transmitted the alert over the airwaves.

The South Otago Aero Club instructor, who was in the plane supervising, said the pilot had accidentally left his finger on the microphone button.

The call was picked up by the Rescue Coordination Centre in Wellington who alerted police at 4.19pm.

The alert was cancelled but police, fire and ambulance services were on the way to the club's airfield in Balclutha and had to be recalled.