He can’t remember the impact, or getting out of his aircraft, but Doug Fossen of Rock Creek miraculously walked away from a plane crash near Mount Baldy.
The 31-year-old rancher was flying a 1946 Fleet Canuck two-seat, single-engine plane from his family’s Rock Creek cattle ranch to a bull sale in Williams Lake at roughly 10 a.m. on the morning of April 17.
He ran into bad weather around Summerland, however, and decided to turn around.
Landing in Oliver, Doug cancelled his flight plan and called his wife Erika to see what the weather was like at the ranch.
When he learned it was fair enough to fly home, Doug took off again for Rock Creek.
At about 11:15 a.m., as he was passing over an area near Mount Baldy, Doug flew into bad weather.
He said he vaguely remembers “getting stuck in some fast-moving cloud and fog” and because the land below him was still covered in snow he became disoriented and “ran into a mountain.”
“The next thing I remember I was waking up,” he said. “I was out of the airplane and starting a fire.
“I was just sitting by my fire and keeping warm.”
Doug, who has been flying since 1995, said he was flying at an altitude of about 1,400 metres when he went down.
He had hit his head on the plane’s radio when the plane crashed and had broken three bones in his hand, likely because he was trying to handle the aircraft’s throttle when it went down, he said.
Equipped with some basic survival gear, including some dry noodles and a “plastic safety sheet,” Doug built a make-shift shelter under one of the plane’s wings.
He also had a global positioning system (GPS) and the plane was also equipped with an Emergency Locator Transmitter.
While out helping at their daughter’s school, Erika called home to see if Doug had arrived.
When he didn’t answer, she tried him on his cellphone.
“He answered only after about three rings and I hardly recognized him,” Erika said. “He said, ‘Erika, I’ve crashed, I’m on the side of a mountain, I’ve hurt my head and my hand, but I’m not going to die.’”
Erika went home and called 911 at about 1:45 p.m.
Emergency personnel were able to call Doug on his cellphone and he gave them his GPS co-ordinates.
By 6:30 p.m. that evening, search and rescue teams from Osoyoos and Oliver, Penticton and Victoria were nearing Doug’s position from the ground and the air and he was able to keep in touch with them using his cellphone.
“I told the search and rescue guys ‘Don’t do anything heroic because I’m fine,’” he said.
Local RCMP members and Doug’s family and friends also assisted in the search.
Because he had crashed on the side of a mountain roughly 3.6 kilometres from road access, however, rescue teams had a difficult time accessing the site.
And so, Doug said, two rescue personnel parachuted to his location from a CC-115 Buffalo aircraft to help co-ordinate the rescue effort.
After nearly seven hours on the mountain, Doug was hoisted to safety by a crew aboard one of three Cormorant helicopters involved in the search.
He was airlifted to Penticton Airport and taken to Penticton Regional Hospital.
Following an overnight stay, Doug was released to his anxious wife and three daughters at about 1 p.m. on April 17.
“I’m just thankful that I only have three broken bones in my hand and 20 stitches in my forehead,” he said.
Doug also expressed his thanks to the search and rescue personnel, paramedics and neighbour who helped him and his family following the crash.
And, he added, the aircraft, which had landed nose down in about half-a-metre of snow, received only moderate damage and will likely fly again.
The landing gear was “twisted and bent,” Doug said, but the body was “all in one piece.”
On April 19, Doug’s father and brother returned to the crash site to figure out how to recover the aircraft.
Doug is scheduled to go in for surgery on April 23 for his hand.
Despite the close-call and the injuries, however, Doug said it won’t be long until he heads into the skies again.
“Just until we get this airplane fixed or until I go buy another one.”
By Paul Everest and Diane Zorn
Osoyoos Times
