Bodies recovered from Kodiak Island air taxi crash as authorities work to retrieve wreckage

The bodies of two passengers who died Sunday in a plane crash on Kodiak Island were recovered from the remote site, and authorities said Wednesday that they’re working to coordinate retrieval of the aircraft wreckage in the coming days.

Three other people were seriously injured during the air taxi crash, including one who was considered to be in critical condition.

It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the plane to crash, said Clint Johnson, the chief of the National Transportation Safety Board’s Alaska office. Investigators spoke briefly with the pilot but also hope to interview the passengers soon, Johnson said Wednesday.

The Piper PA-32-300 operated by Vertigo Air Taxi left Old Harbor on Sunday and was headed to Kodiak when it crashed in shallow, mountainous terrain sometime after 3 p.m. that day, Johnson said. The passengers were headed back from the Kodiak Sportsman’s Lodge when the plane crashed about 3 miles north of Old Harbor, he said. The town is located on the southeast coast of Kodiak Island and is about 70 miles southwest of the city of Kodiak.

The U.S. Coast Guard was notified of the crash through a search and rescue alert that’s automatically sent out by the plane upon impact, a spokeswoman said. The Coast Guard responded to the scene by helicopter and flew the injured survivors to the Kodiak Airport, and from there, they were taken to medical facilities for treatment. Johnson did not have updated information on their condition Wednesday.

Alaska State Troopers said they recovered the bodies of the deceased, whom they have not publicly identified, from the crash area Monday.

An NTSB investigator reached the site Monday and completed an on-scene investigation, Johnson said. The plane had broken into multiple pieces, he said.

The NTSB is working with the operator’s insurance company to coordinate recovery of the wreckage, which Johnson said will ideally happen within the week, depending on the weather. The site can only be reached by helicopter, he said.

Vertigo Air Taxi, the single-engine aircraft’s operator, offers flightseeing, bear-viewing tours, and flights to private lakes for fishing expeditions on Kodiak Island.

“We are heartbroken and devastated,” the company owners said in a prepared statement. “We are working closely with the NTSB to determine the cause. We ask for prayers and thoughts for all families involved as we navigate this tragedy.”