The pilot of a small private aircraft was uninjured after surviving two aviation mishaps on July 1.
Neighbours living in the area of 31st Street, south of the Courtenay Airpark, reported hearing sounds of an aircraft sputtering late Tuesday afternoon before it landed on the muddy estuary at low tide.
“We heard the plane stalling as it flew past our place and thought ‘that doesn’t sound right’ and then I could hear him trying to take off again and it stalled out again,” says Janice Shell.
Shell went down to the area and assisted others in pushing the aircraft off the tidal flat and up into a grassy area after the pilot had unsuccessfully tried to lift off the beach to continue his flight to the Courtenay Airpark.
The plane hit a puddle and uneven ground before the plane’s nose went down into the sand, according to witness Owen Middleton.
“It went to take off and it hit some bumps out there and it ended up kinda crashing almost up to a 180 up there and came back down and got stuck,” Middleton says.
Middleton was one of a group of about eight to 10 individuals who assisted in moving the aircraft to higher ground.
Bonnie Lavallee was another nearby resident who jumped into action following the incident.
”Everybody just stepped in, it was just effortless and we just worked like an amazing team to get it up above the tide line. For Canada Day, we came united just like that,” Lavallee says.
Lavallee says the male pilot and his wife were flying from Victoria to Courtenay to surprise their daughter for her birthday when the pair ran out of fuel just short of the airpark.
Fuel was transferred from a portable gas can into the aircraft before the pilot tried and failed to fly it off the beach. The passenger was not in the aircraft at that time.
Lt. Anthony Gray from the Courtenay Fire Department said the initial call was for a plane crashing in the estuary.
“He did a really good job landing, he landed perfectly, it was good. He and his wife were in there; he was lucky,” Gray says.
Gray also indicates that there didn’t appear to be any fluids leaking in the estuary and notes that the aircraft received damage to the front wheel.
The RV-6 Kitplane was lifted by helicopter on Wednesday morning and was able to complete its journey to the nearby airpark.
