An anonymous driver’s dash-mounted camera captured footage of an airplane that crashed in Anchor Point on Dec. 8 as it plummeted through the air. According to a preliminary report by the National Transportation Safety Board, the dashcam showed the airplane in an inverted flat spin before it disappeared behind trees off the Sterling Highway.
The Piper PA-18-150 crashed at Mile 155 of the Sterling Hwy around 2:00pm on Dec. 8, shutting down the road in both directions for several hours as law enforcement attempted to investigate and control the area around the crash site.
The pilot, Kurt Stjean, 52 of Homer, was killed in the crash, and a female passenger sustained critical injuries and was taken to a hospital for treatment. Stjean’s flight originated from a private airstrip on Pike Lake near King Salmon, and was supposed to fly Northeast toward Chinitna Bay and cross the Cook Inlet to Anchor Point before turning Southeast for Homer.
The NTSB report indicates that the dashcam video captured the spinning, inverted airplane as it descended vertically, and also revealed, “the airplane’s left wing was folded against the fuselage as the descending wreckage entered an area of tree and brush-covered terrain.”
The NSTB’s Alaska region chief, Clint Johnson, said the dashcam left “no uncertainty” as to what caused the plane to crash.
“What that dashcam revealed to us was with no uncertainty that that left wing had failed and the airplane was in an inverted flat spin all the way to the ground,” Johnson told KTUU-TV in Anchorage. “And I can’t stress enough how much we appreciate this gentleman [with the dashcam] coming forward.”
As the NTSB continues their investigation, they are asking anyone who witnessed the crash to reach out to them at witness@NTSB.gov.