On Tuesday afternoon, a home-built Zenith CH801 airplane made an emergency landing on Highway 18 between Lake Cowichan and Skutz Falls. Pilot Stewart Hicks cited fuel starvation as the issue that forced him to land, the exact cause of which is still unknown. He said the engine cut out just above Lake Cowichan.
“My first thought was getting it down in one piece. And me with it,” he said. “I just came in for a normal landing, with no engine, and on the road. And fortunately there was no truck coming in the other direction.”
He was making a local flight at the time. “I was heading up the Valley and then back to Duncan,” he said. Hicks knew he was in trouble when, just as he reached the south shore of Cowichan Lake, his engine cut off.
He brought it down onto the highway about four kilometres outside of Lake Cowichan. The RCMP was alerted by a passerby at approximately 1 p.m.
“The complainant basically said there’s an airplane taxiing on the highway,” said RCMP Cpl. Rory Goncalves. “By the time we go out there the owner and operator of the plane had been able to push it mostly off of the road.”
The pilot was assisted by members of the public in pulling the plane off to the shoulder.
Goncalves said there were some “close calls” that afternoon due to motorists trying to stop and take photos.
“I just want to make the public aware that distracted driving is a big issue these days and if we weren’t occupied dealing with that plane we would be writing a lot of tickets because there were a lot of people driving and taking photos as they drove by, causing some grief for us,” he said.
“[It was] a definite concern for safety, especially with the logging trucks going up and down that highway. Traffic slowing down, a logging truck doesn’t have the same stopping power as a car might…Luckily no one was injured.”
Goncalves said he could not comment on whether or not the pilot faces any charges or safety violations. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is responsible for investigating aviation accidents or emergencies. They say they are continuing to gather information on the emergency landing.
In all his time with the RCMP, Goncalves said he has never witnessed something quite like Tuesday’s incident.
“I’ve seen a lot of things, but this is my first time dealing with an airplane landing on a highway. Not something you see every day,” he said.
The pilot echoed this sentiment.
Hicks has been flying since the 1960s and says he’s never experienced something like this.
“Not on a road, no. It’s a first,” he said, adding there was no damage to the plane during the course of the landing.
“Any landing you walk away from is a good landing,” he added.