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Float plane crashes avoiding kayakers, kills three on Vancouver Island

June 14, 2000

CAMPBELL RIVER, B.C. (CP) - An elementary school group of kayakers watched in horror as a float plane appeared to veer to miss them before crashing nose-down onto a beach Tuesday morning, killing all three people aboard.

Kayak instructor Dave Lundine said he was out on the water with 22 students from grades 3 and 4, their teacher and some parents when the plane roared in over just their heads.

"I think it was trying to do an emergency landing where we were located," Lundine said. "When it saw us it tried to bank, but it just stalled and dropped out of the sky.

"It went up and then straight down into the ground about 50 feet (15 metres) in front of us."

"It was close," he said. "It was way too close, maybe 30 feet (nine metres) over our heads."

Lundine said many of the children screamed and started crying.

He went to the shore to try to put the flames out.

Capt. Gabriel Ringutte, of the Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Victoria, said the Cessna 180 plane was registered to Action Adventure Tours of Vancouver.

The pilot was identified as Arpi Mandalik, who turned 34 Tuesday. The names of the two passengers were withheld until their relatives have been notified.

The crash occurred on the north shore of McIvor Lake, just west of Campbell River.

The centre said the plan had flown from Vancouver about 140 kilometres northwest to Powell Lake, near Powell River on the mainland, before flying across the Strait of Georgia to McIvor Lake.

The Campbell River fire department brought the jaws of life to the scene. A local search and rescue squad as well as a Labrador helicopter and crew from nearby CFB Comox also responded.

The RCMP and the coroner were also there as well as a Transportation Safety Board investigator.

The plane crashed near a popular swimming area with its nose into the ground and with its tail sticking in the air. There was no one on the beach at the time.

The crash occurred in light rain and there was a slight chop on the lake.

The students, from Discovery Passage elementary, their teacher and parents were taken back to the school to meet with crisis counselors.

"We had our crisis response team in place to attempt to deal with the trauma that they had just witnessed," said Julie MacRae, Campbell River school district superintendent.

"The crisis counselors will be available to the staff, students and parents at the school for as long as it necessary."

http://www.southam.com/montrealgazette/cgi/newsnow.pl?file=/cpfs/national/000614/n061401.html

-- (Dee360Degree@aol.com), June 14, 2000