An aircraft carrying six people had to make an emergency landing on a street in Calgary, Canada, moments after radioing a control tower to say the plane had a problem.The pilot of the Piper Navajo airplane contacted air traffic control on Wednesday morning, April 25, to report engine trouble.
“I’ve just lost the right fuel pump, that’s why we’re requesting 35 right,” the pilot can be heard saying on a recording, according to this report by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC).
Security camera footage featured in the video report below shows the plane making its descent in the moments before touching down.
No injuries were reported.
CBC reported that the plane skimmed past eyewitness Jarrett Stobbe, who was on his way to work when he saw the plane immediately overhead.
“I heard this loud noise and looked up, and it came right over my head,” he said. “It was coming in at kind of an angle and clipped that light post, then landed. The pilot did a heck of a job to get it down like that.”
The plane sustained minor damage when it clipped a light pole shortly before landing.
The small plane was inbound to Calgary International Airport with six people aboard just after 5:30 a.m.
Acting District Chief Jason Graham of the Calgary Fire Department said the pilot did “an amazing job” in bringing the plane down safely.
The twin-engine plane was approaching Calgary International Airport at around 5:30 am local time with six people onboard.
Super T Aviation, the company that owns and operates the airplane, said the pilot was highly experienced. A statement by the carrier said the emergency landing was caused by a “loss of power of unknown cause.”
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada said more time would be needed to pinpoint the reason for the incident.
“We will be collecting data, we‘ll conduct witness interviews, we’ll examine and photograph the wreckage,” said Mike Adam, an investigator with the Transportation Safety Board of Canada, CBC reported.
“We'll also examine the maintenance history, meteorological conditions, operation of the equipment, operation policies, and regulation requirements.”
Local resident Jamal Hammoud thought the emergency lights he spotted out of the window of his home overlooking 36th Street were due to a traffic accident.
“I thought it was a C-Train accident,” he said, according to this Calgary Herald report. “When I looked, I couldn’t see the CTrain, but (I saw) an airplane.”
Hammoud told the paper that he then checked security camera footage to see if the incident had been caught on tape.
“I saw the airplane landing, just missing a car,” he said.
Footage in the news report above shows the moment the plane landed on the street.
