I think they were trying to use fancy language to say "on the face of it", or in other words, obviously erroneous.
Lawyers get paid hundreds of dollars per hour to use words like that.
And the few times you will need to see your altimeter in the dark, you can solve that with a $2 chemlight on your helmet forehead that will shine down on it when you pull it in front of your face.
Well heck, you've got the serial number. The factory should be able to tell you who the original purchaser was. If it wasn't stolen from him, then track it forward from there.
Heck, tie some orange surveyors tape to a hind leg so he's highly visible on the ground. You could even watch him streamer in! Probably wouldn't slow him down much to cheat the experiment.