[akham]

Bering Air flight BRG445, a Cessna 208B Grand Caravan EX registration N321BA, has gone missing during a flight from Unalakleet (UNK) to Nome (OME), Alaska. There are ten POB and a search operation is in progress.

The flight took off from runway 33 at UNK at 14:38 LT (23:38 UTC). It turned left and started tracking 287° over the water of Norton Sound toward OME. The aircraft climbed to a cruising altitude if about 7700 feet. The descent to OME was started at 15:11.

The last ADS-B datapoint captured by Flightradar24 was at 15:16:34 while the aircraft was descending through 5300 feet, at 38 nm from OME.

Photo attached (N321BA.jpg) of the incident aircraft. Photos also attached showing interior and exterior views of a similar aircraft also operated by Bering Air.

Aviation Safety Network: https://asn.flightsafety.org/wikibase/475576

FlightRadar24 data for the flight: https://www.flightradar24.com/data/a...321ba#39086384

Bering Air X: https://x.com/BeringAir

Nome Volunteer Fire Dept (involved in search, posting updates): https://www.facebook.com/NVFDAlaska

Alaska State Troopers: https://www.facebook.com/AlaskaStateTroopersOfficial

The Nome Nugget (local newspaper?!?!): https://www.facebook.com/NomeNuggetNews

[akham]

Per FAA records (link below) Bering Air and N321BA were certified under Part 135 (commuter or on-demand operations).

https://www.faa.gov/about/officeorg/...rt-135-holders

Bering Air has had a few incidents over the years, one fatal (pilot only) back in 1987. Photo of summary attached, source: https://asn.flightsafety.org/wikibas...&submit=Submit

Also a pilot forgetting to lower landing gear in 2017 (photo attached).

Probable cause:"The pilot's failure to extend the landing gear before landing, which resulted in a gear-up landing. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's fatigue and complacency."

ASN summary of 2017 incident: https://asn.flightsafety.org/wikibase/319788

[Tony76]

That's a great shame. Are the people onboard all presumed deceased as of now?

[Hogmann]

Confusing for sure. Looking at the plot of the flight it's a nice stable constant speed descent right up until about 1200 ft above the surface where the descent rate and the airspeed both pick up a little bit, then pretty much straight into the water.

No distress call or emergency beacon either. A coworker of mine used to fly Caravans in Alaska not this part but not far from there and some of the stories of what is normal for them makes me cringe. Someone else suggested this might be a freezing rain situation which is a distinct possibility because the temperature up there swings pretty wildly from above freezing to well below freezing and temperature inversions are possible. Maybe they were building ice thinking it would be okay they'd be able to descend out of it and they were almost to the airport anyway and just got too covered with ice too quickly.

[akham]

Hot off the press from the Nome Nugget (!?!) just now, reporting from the press conference that is currently taking place:

In a press briefing from the Coast Guard Assistant Chief in the Office of Incident Management Benjamin McIntyre-Coble said at this time there has been an item of interest identified in the search area, the Coast Guard MH 60 is going to that location. “What that is, and what that might shake out to be, and what the status of the people who may or may not be there is, I can't speculate to at this time,” McIntyre said.

Source: https://www.facebook.com/NomeNuggetN...ETbyv2vLBL8hQl

[HIGHTECHDUDE]

Originally Posted by USCGAlaska

USCG has ended its search for the missing plane after the aircraft was located approx. 34 miles southeast of Nome. 3 individuals were found inside and reported to be deceased.

The remaining 7 people are believed to be inside the aircraft but are currently inaccessible due to the condition of the plane. Our heartfelt condolences are with those affected by this tragic incident.

[kellyhound]

Two passengers aboard the plane that crashed near Nome have been identified as employees of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium (ANTHC).

The passengers, Rhone Baumgartner and Kameron Hartvigson, both worked in utility operations for ANTHC as part of the Division of Environmental Health and Engineering team.

They were traveling to Unalakleet to service a heating system that is critical to their water plant, according to ANTHC organization leaders.

[Hogmann]

Sounds like it was snowing in Nome at the time so they were instructed to hold while the plows cleared the runway for them. The wreckage looks like a stall spin possible flat spin from fairly low altitude. Possibly he was trying to set up the hold in his flight management system and got distracted and stalled the plane. Also I wouldn't be surprised if icing played a factor in this

[akham]

Originally Posted by Hogmann ↗

Sounds like it was snowing in Nome at the time so they were instructed to hold while the plows cleared the runway for them. The wreckage looks like a stall spin possible flat spin from fairly low altitude. Possibly he was trying to set up the hold in his flight management system and got distracted and stalled the plane. Also I wouldn't be surprised if icing played a factor in this

Reminds me of ....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voepass_Flight_2283

[MacAKM]

As always