A few years ago, I was working on a major test range, and one of our test facilities lost an item during testing.
It was a projectile that had taken an errant course, and the customer needed it to be recovered as soon as possible so the recorder data could be evaluated.
The team on site had spent almost 3 months performing grid searches by foot and had even given the video footage to the math lab so the computer programmers could run calculations on where this item might have landed.
Still not being able to locate the item; the Lead Engineer brought me the video footage, and within 2 days, some basic projectile motion physics, and critical thinking I was able to direct them to within 234 feet of the item. This was 10,000 feet closer than the computer simulations.