PIKANGIKUM FIRST NATION, Ont. — The Transportation Safety Board and Northern Skies Air Service are investigating the cause of an incident in which a chartered aircraft landed with its wheels up.
No one was injured when a twin-engine Navajo Chieftain PA-31 350 did a belly landing Tuesday afternoon at the Pikangikum airport.
The plane, carrying five passengers and two crew members, had arrived at Pikangikum from Poplar Hill First Nation to pick up two more passengers.
Northern Skies is owned by the First Nations communities of Weenusk, Attawapiskat, Kashechewan and Fort Albany.
CEO Ron Basaraba said in an interview Wednesday morning that the investigation into what happened was just starting.
"We don't know the cause of this. The root cause, we have no idea."
Basaraba told Tbnewswatch the five-year-old airline has flown close to 7,000 charters, and this is the first incident of its kind.
"We have an awesome safety record," he said on the phone from the company's Sioux Lookout base.
The aircraft, one of three in the fleet, was to be assessed for damage on Wednesday.
