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Dive teams plunged into the icy cold waters of a southeast Alaska inlet Tuesday, searching an area the size of 24 football fields for two cruise ship passengers missing after two sightseeing planes collided.

The Coast Guard has confirmed four fatalities in the collision Monday afternoon near Ketchikan, a popular destination for cruise ships in Alaska. Ten people, all Americans, were injured. The missing passengers were from Canada and Australia, Princess Cruises said.

The Royal Princess, which can carry up to 3,600 people, was among four city-sized cruise ships in the tiny coastal community on Monday...

Another popular trip is flightseeing in Misty Fjords National Monument. Visitors marvel at the lakes, snowcapped peaks and glacier valleys in the wilderness area. Trips cost about $260 each.

The larger plane, a de Havilland Otter DHC-3 with 10 passengers and the pilot, was returning from Misty Fjord when it collided with another sightseeing plane, carrying four passengers from the same cruise ship and a pilot.

The cause of the crash in relatively good weather, high overcast skies with light southeast winds was not known. The crash occurred about eight miles (13 kilometers) from Ketchikan, near George Inlet. The planes came down about a mile and a half apart with some of the debris field on land. Their altitude wasn't immediately known.

The smaller plane, a de Havilland DHC-2 Beaver, was partially submerged in the shore of George Inlet after the single-engine plane overturned and hit some trees before crashing, according to Coast Guard Lt. Brian Dykens. The larger Otter landed in water and sank, he said.

Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board were due to arrive later Tuesday.

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Two sightseeing planes carrying cruise ship passengers in Alaska collided at an altitude of 3,300 feet before they crashed, the National Transportation Safety Board announced after a team arrived from Washington, D.C., to investigate the crash.

The two planes collided in midair Monday, and the Coast Guard raised the death toll to six people on Tuesday after finding the bodies of two people who had been missing. Five of the dead were passengers and the sixth was the pilot of one of the planes.

Federal investigators said the larger plane, a de Havilland Otter DHC-3 with 10 passengers and its pilot, had descended from 3,800 feet feet and collided with a smaller de Havilland DHC-2 Beaver, carrying four passengers from the same cruise ship, the Royal Princess, and the pilot.

The federal investigation into the cause of the crash could take months, but a preliminary report is expected to be released within two weeks, said Peter Knudson, a spokesman for the NTSB.

Coast Guard Lt. Brian Dykens said Tuesday evening that his agency and the Ketchikan Volunteer Rescue Squad found the two bodies of those who were missing near the crash site of the smaller plane involved in the collision, a single-engine de Havilland DHC-2 Beaver.

The planes came down about 1½ miles apart, with some of the debris falling onto land near George Inlet, about 8 miles from the cruise ship port of Ketchikan.

The Beaver, the smaller plane, appears to have broken apart in midair, according to Jerry Kiffer, duty incident commander of the Ketchikan Volunteer Rescue Squad. He said the plane’s tail and a section of the fuselage were 900 feet from the aircraft’s floats, which landed near shore.

The smaller plane was partially submerged in the shore of George Inlet after the single-engine plane overturned and hit some trees before crashing, according to Coast Guard Lt. Brian Dykens. The larger Otter landed in water and sank, he said.

One passenger on the larger plane died, as did two passengers and the pilot on the smaller plane, Princess Cruises said in a statement.

Alaska State Troopers in a statement late Tuesday identified the passengers who died as Louis Botha, 46, of San Diego, Simon Brodie, 56, from Temple, New South Wales, Australia, Cassandra Webb, 62, from St. Louis, Ryan Wilk, 39, from Utah, and Elsa Wilk, 37, of Richmond, British Columbia, Canada. Also killed was the pilot of one of the planes, Randy Sullivan, 46, of Ketchikan.

The larger plane was operated by Taquan Air of Ketchikan and passengers booked the flights through the cruise ship as an excursion. The other plane was operated by Mountain Air Service of Ketchikan, and the four booked the flight independent of the cruise ship, Princess Cruises said.

After the crash, the 10 injured people initially were taken to a hospital in Ketchikan. Four patients with broken bones were transferred later to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, spokeswoman Susan Gregg said.

Three survivors were released from PeaceHealth Ketchikan Medical Center in Ketchikan on Tuesday. Hospital spokeswoman Marty West said the remaining three are in fair condition.

The Royal Princess left Vancouver, British Columbia, on May 11 and was scheduled to arrive in Anchorage on Saturday.

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May 28, 2019.

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Charles Hanas, known as Chuck by his friends, was the first person to arrive at the scene of Monday’s fatal two plane collision in Ketchikan. He and his wife Colleen Nesbitt were aboard their boat, the “Hotel California,” when they saw a plane going down in George Inlet. Hanas quickly steered toward the plane while sending out a call for coast guard assistance over the radio.

“When I came closer, I saw a bunch of people floating in an area of 50 or 60 yards,” Hanas said. “The airplane crashed and went tail up... then sank within minutes.”

As it turns out, that plane was the Taquan Air “otter” plane that went down during the mid-air collision.
Hanas got into his inflatable raft and began pulling the injured passengers to shore while his wife kept their boat off the rocks and out of the way

“I went to the first person, one woman was calling for help and when I got to her she was bleeding quite a bit, but her husband, or the man that was with her, was not doing well. I think it ended up that he had a broken back.”

Hanas told KTUU that because he was unable to lift the injured passengers into his small raft, he maneuvered up to several people one by one and had them hold onto his raft while he towed them to shore.

It wasn’t until he’d gotten all 10 survivors to shore that the pilot told Hanas one passenger had died inside of the airplane.
He also didn’t know there was another plane involved until other vessels started responding to assist with the rescue.

The planes ended up more than a mile apart on opposite sides of George Inlet. Hanas guesses he was there for about 20 minutes before the next boat arrived to help

It’s likely that Hanas saved several passengers that were too injured to swim, but he told KTUU he was simply doing what he could until more help arrived.

“I don’t think anybody’s ever ready for it, but I’ve commercially fished all of my life so I’m familiar with the ocean, he said. “There wasn’t much that I could do with no medical equipment. I just kept saying help is on the way.”

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