Two people escaped serious injury Saturday afternoon after their floatplane crashed during takeoff in the Misty Fjords National Monument, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
The crash site — about 40 miles southeast of Ketchikan — is in the same vicinity as Thursday’s sightseeing crash that killed six people.
RELATED: Georgia mom and daughter among 6 killed in plane crash near Ketchikan
The Cessna 180 crashed Saturday near a public recreational cabin at Humpback Lake. It was privately owned and not part of a charter tour, said Coast Guard Petty Officer Melissa McKenzie.
A distress call via satellite phone was received at 2:45 p.m., shortly after the crash, McKenzie said. The two people aboard the plane were well-prepared for an emergency, she said.
“They actually had a personal locator beacon that they were able to set off that basically led our responders to their exact location,” McKenzie told KRBD on Saturday evening. “And they also had a dry bag that had clothes and food that they took with them to the shore when they swam from the plane.”
An MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter from Coast Guard Air Station Sitka arrived at the U.S. Forest Service cabin. A rescuer was lowered and hoisted up the two people. The Coast Guard said they were not injured, and were transferred to emergency personnel waiting in Ketchikan.
[Sign up for Alaska Public Media’s daily newsletter to get our top stories delivered to your inbox.]
It’s unclear what went wrong on takeoff. Weather conditions on scene were about 65 degrees with light winds. Visibility was about 10 miles with cloud ceilings at 5,000 feet.
Misty Fjords National Monument is a popular destination for flightseeing tours. Since 2015, at least 21 people — including six last Thursday — have been killed in crashes in the region. Also on Saturday, authorities released the names of the five cruise ship visitors and pilots killed in that crash.
