Plane crashes into river
MERRIFIELD - A small airplane crashed Thursday night into the Mississippi River east of Merrifield.
The crash, reported about 8 p.m., happened off Pickerel Lane, south of Sorensen Lake Road. The single engine Piper P-18 airplane crash landed in a rice paddy on the Mississippi River moments after taking off from the Brainerd Regional Airport.
The pilot, Rory Fredstrom, 59, of Brainerd, was able to get out of the airplane with minor injuries, said Crow Wing County Sheriff Todd Dahl, and was checked at the scene by North Ambulance personnel.
The tail section was all that could be seen of an airplane that crashed Thursday night into the marshy Mississippi River east of Merrifield. The pilot was able to get out of the plane with minor injuries. Brainerd Dispatch/Kelly Humphrey» Purchase reprints of this photo.
Fredstrom reported losing speed and altitude after take off and was forced to "ditch the plane into the rice paddies" on the river, according to a Crow Wing County Sheriff's report. Fredstrom was then helped to shore by several fishermen who were in the area at the time of the crash.
The sheriff's department boat and water patrol launched at French Rapids and worked their way in the river north to the crash site. The Mission Township and Brainerd fire departments were called to the scene to help contain a fuel spill from the airplane.
"We're a little worried now as far as gas leaking," into the river, Dahl said.
The cause of the crash is currently under investigation by the Crow Wing County Sheriff's office and the Federal Aviation Administration.
Thursday's crash was the fourth small airplane crash in the Brainerd area in the past two months.
A Ham Lake man escaped injury June 14 after his float plane crashed on Camp Lake in Roosevelt Township south of Garrison after the pilot veered into trees along the shore line when in the process of landing on the lake.
Two people were injured in a June 20 after an ultralight airplane crashed in the water near Gull Point on the southern end of Gull Lake in East Gull Lake. No one was injured when a small float plane crashed July 3 on Lower Hay Lake west of the Whitefish Chain in Ideal Township.