The window for recovery and investigation at the site of a fatal plane wreck near Nome will be limited due to unstable sea ice conditions and an incoming winter storm.
“It’s a dynamic situation,” Jim West Jr., chief of the Nome Volunteer Fire Department and local head of the incident response told reporters on Friday evening. “It’s slushy, young ice. It’s not stable.”
The Bering Air Cessna 208B Grand Caravan crashed on its way to Nome from Unalakleet with a pilot and nine passengers on board. All 10 people are presumed dead, the Coast Guard said.
An alphabet soup of responding agencies had relatively safe conditions to work the search-and-rescue operation on Friday and locate the plane, about 34 miles southeast of Nome on Norton Sound sea ice. The search became a recovery operation.
The Coast Guard was able to put two rescue divers on the ice at the site.
“They were able to see inside the aircraft, and they saw three individuals who were unresponsive without any signs of life,” Coast Guard spokesperson Mike Salerno said Friday.
He said the rest of the aircraft was inaccessible due to the extent of the damage. The other seven people “are believed to be inside that wreckage, and unfortunately, of course, it does not appear to be a survivable crash,” Salerno said.
The National Weather Service has issued a winter weather advisory for the area beginning Sunday. It expects a mix of snow, ice and rain, wind gusts up to 45 mph, and temperatures rising to the high 30s by Sunday morning.
West said the hope is to recover the bodies first, then the wreckage.
The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating what caused the crash. Alaska Chief Clint Johnson said the agency has one investigator on the ground in Nome, who’s immediate goal is to “document perishable evidence” for their investigation. Nine more NTSB experts are on their way.
Flight data show the plane’s elevation falling sharply in the minutes leading up to its last location ping.
Officials have not identified the 10 people presumed dead in the crash. But in a news release late Friday, the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium said two of the passengers were their employees. Rhone Baumgartner and Kameron Hartvigson both worked in utility operations for the organization and had traveled to Unalakleet to service part of the community’s water plant, according to the press release.
In the statement, ANTHC Interim President and CEO Natasha Singh said the employees were “passionate about the work they did, cared deeply for the communities they served, and made a lasting impact on rural communities across our state.”
She said her thoughts were with their families and “everyone else who lost a loved one today.”
Nome Mayor John Handeland asked for compassion and mutual support in the wake of the tragedy.
“Hug your people tonight – tightly. And often. God bless you all,” he said Friday.
