Three passengers on a small plane that lost engine power minutes after takeoff suffered only minor injuries after the pilot deployed a parachute system that facilitated the plane's forced landing.
The Mendocino County Sheriff's Office received a call Friday around 1:15 p.m. about a possible plane crash in Whitehorn, an unincorporated community in Humboldt County.
When sheriff's deputies along with other first responders arrived at the crash site, they discovered the plane's three occupants, who had suffered minor cuts and scrapes.
The three were identified as a family from Santa Rosa, a man and a woman, both 38 years old, and a girl, 2.
During the officer's investigation of the incident, they learned that the plane's engine lost power about five minutes after taking off from Shelter Cove Airport.
The pilot immediately began troubleshooting the lack of engine power, but noticed the plane's altitude was too low to recover from, according to the sheriff's news release.
Realizing it was too late to restart the engine, the pilot deployed the plane's Cirrus parachute system, which slowed the plane's descent, according to the news release.
The parachute system, which is attached to the top of the fuselage, carried the plane until it crashed into a tree in a heavily forested area.
Several first responders assisted at the crash scene, including the Humboldt County Sheriff's Office, California Highway Patrol, CalFire, Southern Humboldt Tech Rescue and members of the Whale Gulch, Shelter Cove and Whitethorn fire departments.
On Shelter Cove's Instagram account, the department said this was the second small plane crash it had responded to in the last two years. Both incidents, he claimed, resulted in minor injuries and no fatalities, and both planes were destroyed.
