One person is dead and another seriously injured following a plane crash into a lake on Friday night east of Edmonton.
The plane went down into the lake, located 60 kilometres east of the city just northeast of the Town of Tofield.
RCMP said they were contacted by the Department of National Defence’s Joint Rescue Coordination Centre at 9:10 p.m. Friday to help locate the overdue plane, which was on a training flight.
It was located just after midnight about 200 metres offshore in the northwest part of the lake. A team consisting of personnel from Tofield RCMP. Beaver County Fire & Rescue, Edmonton Police Service Air Services, and Search and Rescue Canada performed the search.
“I can just imagine how terrifying it would have been for the survivor to be trapped in a plane, in the water with somebody deceased next to them, so thankfully we were able to get there in time and get that person the help that they needed,” RCMP Cpl. Gina Slaney told CTV News Edmonton on Sunday.
STARS air rescue provided airlift service to an Edmonton hospital.
One person was pronounced dead, and the other was seriously injured.
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is investigating the crash.
A spokeswoman for the board told CTV News Edmonton its team will finish the field examination on Sunday.
“In the days coming up, we will complete the detailed technical examination of the aircraft, conduct interviews and analyze the flight path data recorded on radar and from the aircraft avionics,” Sophie Wistaff, the Transportation Safety Board’s media relations/communications team lead, said on Sunday.
The recovery of the aircraft should be finished later Sunday afternoon. The wreckage will then be transported to the Transportation Safety Board’s facilities in Edmonton.