The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating after a seaplane crashed Thursday near Sucia Island in Washington’s San Juan Islands.
Police say all 10 passengers and the pilot aboard survived and were rescued by the military and nearby boaters. In a written statement, Kenmore Air said Thursday that four passengers had been injured.
As of Friday afternoon, three of those passengers remain hospitalized: one at PeaceHealth St. Joseph Medical Center in Bellingham, and two at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.
A spokesperson for Harborview said the two passengers there — one male and one female, both in their 20s — are in satisfactory condition.
The pilot has been released from the hospital, Kenmore Air said Friday.
It’s still too early to determine a cause of the crash, but Kenmore Air did write in its statement Friday that a weather system in the area at the time of the crash caused the pilot to adjust their flight path.
The plane left Lake Union in Seattle at 4:30 p.m. Thursday and was bound for Roche Harbor on San Juan Island. About 45 minutes later, people called 911 saying the plane had crashed in Shallow Bay off Sucia Island.
Videos posted to social media show the plane tilting side to side before abruptly hitting the water. Other videos show bits of plane wreckage in the water, engulfed in a large fire.
San Juan County Sheriff Eric Peter told KUOW that the Navy and Coast Guard rescued people out of the water and into helicopters. Passengers suffered broken bones and lacerations, Peter said.
“And we know that one civilian boat had picked up somewhere in the range of one to three people to get them out of the water before our team showed up,” Peter said.
Peter said the cause of the emergency landing and fire isn’t known yet.
The NTSB said Friday it expects to recover the sunken seaplane and move it to a facility to be examined. The agency says it will look at all kinds of information to find out what went wrong, including weather conditions, plane maintenance, and the pilot’s health records. NTSB investigators say they’ll release an initial report within a month, but a probable cause likely won’t be public for one to two years.
Kenmore Air confirmed that the passenger seaplane was a de Havilland DHC-3 Otter aircraft. These planes are known for their longevity and have been in service since the 1960s.
The same make and model of plane crashed in 2022 in Mutiny Bay off of Whidbey Island, killing all 10 people on board.
Kenmore Air said Friday that the plane in this crash was built in 1960, and was up-to-date on its required inspections. The company says maintenance records show the last 100-hour inspection was on June 25, and its most recent annual inspection was completed in January.
In a Facebook post, the San Juan County Sheriff’s Office wrote that Coast Guard environmental response personnel will assess potential environmental impacts.
Peter said the plane sank underwater shortly after the fire. It isn’t clear if any wreckage has been found yet, but he said that will be part of the federal investigation.
“If it’s anything like the one we had a few years ago, there may be divers that come out later on to go check out the wreckage and try to get it out of the water,” Peter said.
A Kenmore Air spokesperson told KUOW that all flights on Friday were canceled. The company plans to resume regular flights on Saturday.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
