A Yute Commuter Service plane missed the runway while attempting to land in the village of Kwigillingok on Thursday. The incident was witnessed by several village residents and all on board are reported to be okay.
Gavin Phillip works for the Kwigillingok Tribal Council’s Indian Environmental General Assistance Program or IGAP Department. He says that he was outside, inspecting the tribe’s heavy equipment, when he saw the plane descending. Everything looked normal. Then a fellow worker told him that something had gone wrong. Phillip rode his four-wheeler the approximately 800 meters to the landing strip.
When he got there he saw a small white plane sitting in the snow, just to the west of the Kwigillingok runway. He said that two passengers and one pilot walked off the plane. Phillip and others offered to take the passengers and pilot to the village clinic, but each said that they were fine and didn’t need to go.
Yute Commuter Service told KYUK that they had no comment on the incident. Yute Commuter Service is a new Bethel aviation company recently opened by Renfro's Alaskan Adventures.
