A West Wind Aviation King Air. Photo courtesy westwindaviation.ca
A West Wind Aviation official says seven airplane passengers and two crew members are safe after the pilot on a Key Lake-bound flight noticed a gear issue and decided to return to La Ronge.
Emergency vehicles were called to the La Ronge airport Wednesday afternoon, but their services weren’t needed as the Beechcraft King Air flight landed without incident, said Dennis Baranieski, West Wind’s Vice-President of Business Development and Customer Relations.
“Upon approaching Key Lake for landing they noticed there was a gear indication issue that they weren’t comfortable with so they decided to return to La Ronge and make sure our maintenance people could have a look at that particular gear issue,” Baranieski said.
He said he wasn’t aware of how long passengers were delayed before they were taken to Key Lake in another aircraft.
He considers the incident to be a minor one.
“Our crews are well-trained to handle it. They do that training to make sure they are very aware of what kind of actions to take and really it becomes kind of a standard procedure without any great concern at all,” Baranieski said.
“For obvious safety reasons,” maintenance will make sure to take a look at the aircraft, find what caused the Wednesday situation, and rectify it, he said.