2 dead, 3 injured in air-taxi crash on Kodiak Island

Two people died and three were injured Sunday afternoon during a plane crash on Kodiak Island, an official from the National Transportation Safety Board said.

The Piper PA-32-300 plane took off from Old Harbor and was headed to its base of operations in Kodiak when it crashed in shallow, mountainous terrain sometime after 3 p.m., said Clint Johnson, the chief of the NTSB’s Alaska office. The wreckage is located about three miles north of Old Harbor, according to the U.S. Coast Guard. Old Harbor is located on the southeast coast of Kodiak Island and is about 70 miles southwest of the city of Kodiak.

The Coast Guard was notified of the crash by a search-and-rescue satellite-aided tracking alert around 3:30 p.m., they said in a statement. The alert is automatically sent out from planes when there is an impact or a crash, said Coast Guard spokeswoman Lexie O’Brien.

An MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter aircrew was diverted to the area of the crash and arrived on scene just before 5 p.m., the Coast Guard said. Two people died at the scene and three were injured, they said.

The crew hoisted two of the injured people, who were in stable condition, onto the helicopter and brought them to the Kodiak Airport, O’Brien said. From there, a good Samaritan transported them to a medical facility using a Cessna airplane, she said.

The Coast Guard crew returned to the crash site to rescue the remaining survivor, who was in critical condition, and brought them to the Kodiak Airport, where they took a medical airlift to a hospital for care, O’Brien said.

A good Samaritan in a helicopter also responded to the crash, O’Brien said. The pilot had either been in the area or heard of the crash on the radio and landed below it and hiked up to try and help, O’Brien said. The extent of their involvement after was not immediately known, she said.

The wreckage was in an area where it would have been difficult or impossible to land a plane, so it was only accessible by helicopter, according to O’Brien.

The single-engine plane had been operating as an on-demand charter when the crash happened, although details about the charter were not immediately known, Johnson said. It was operated by Vertigo Air Taxi, according to Johnson. The company’s website advertises flightseeing, bear-viewing tours, and flights to private lakes for fishing expeditions.

It was not immediately clear what caused the plane to crash. An NTSB investigator traveled to Kodiak early Monday and plans to visit the site of the wreckage to investigate, Johnson said.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.