Stranded teenagers rescued after six hours thanks to creative distress signal

Three teenagers stranded in a remote area of Australia were rescued after writing a distress message in the sand.

The vehicle driven by the group of youngsters got stuck in the Hutt Lagoon area south of Kalbarri, a remote stretch of Western Australia's Mid West coast.

At the time of the incident on Saturday afternoon, the group didn't have any four-wheel-drive recovery kit or a personal locater beacon, according to the state's police.

To attract the attention of people flying over the area, the resourceful teens wrote "help" in the sand in huge letters.

The attempt was successful, with one pilot spotting them at approximately 3pm local time. 

After being notified by the pilot, officers from Kalbarri Police and the Mid West-Gascoyne Traffic Unit were deployed to the area.

Local authorities received a second, similar report around half an hour later, after another person aboard a different plane spotted the distress signal.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) provided support to the rescue operation with their Perth-based Challenger jet flying over the area and giving GPS coordinates to police officers on the ground.

After having located the trio, who had remained stranded for around six hours, police took them to Lucky Bay and reunited them with their family and friends. Their vehicle wasn't immediately recovered. 

The teenagers, who were uninjured, were the latest group to require the support of emergency personnel after being stranded in a remote part of West Australia.

Last month, a South Australian couple were forced to activate a personal locater beacon after their car had become bogged and they were stranded for four nights on a remote bush track on the Nullarbor.

In April, a group of eight people were rescued by helicopter after spending three days stranded on a dirt track.