Radar still tracks them if they cancel flight following, it just means ATC doesn’t have to provide them with traffic advisories or other guidance. Also there are loads of ADSB trackers (how flight aware works) that they would have to shut their transponder off to disable, which is not what sounds like happened.
Radar still tracks them if they cancel flight following, it just means ATC doesn’t have to provide them with traffic advisories or other guidance. Also there are loads of ADSB trackers (how flight aware works) that they would have to shut their transponder off to disable, which is not what sounds like happened.