The Park County Sheriff’s Office dealt with an unusual non-rescue after an aircraft landed upside-down on a mountain west of Cody.
Around 9:30 a.m. Friday, the Park County Communications Center received a notification from the United States Air Force Rescue Coordination Center (USAFRCC) about a crashed aircraft.
The aircraft’s Emergency Location Transmitter (ELT) had been automatically activated near Sheep Mountain, just outside Cody.
Deputies with the Park County Sheriff’s Office immediately mobilized to respond until they received another notification. The USAFRCC managed to contact the pilot, who was a little topsy-turvy but otherwise fine and didn’t need a rescue.
Then, on Sunday, another individual called the Park County Communications Center to report an upside-down aircraft on Sheep Mountain. Park County Search and Rescue (PCSAR) mobilized once again, only to be called off after contacting the aircraft owner, also the pilot who walked away from the landing on Friday.
“Apparently, he did not successfully get the message across that he decided to park upside-down on top of a mountain,” said Monte McClain, a spokesman with the Park County Sheriff's Office.
Impact Only
The USAFRCC is a federal agency that coordinates federal search-and-rescue operations in the United States. The agency’s more notable missions include the response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the Space Shuttle Columbia crash.
McClain said the Friday notification about the plane crash came directly from the USAFRCC. They got a signal from the aircraft’s ELT and immediately alerted first responders in the vicinity.
“These things are triggered by impact,” he said. “When the beacon goes off, it sends a signal to a satellite that’s routed to the Air Force, they get the coordinates and call the closest available agency.”
That explains why deputies were already heading toward the coordinates when they were informed that the pilot was unharmed and didn’t need a rescue. The USAFRCC connected with the pilot after they sent the ELT notification to the Park County Communications Center.
The aircraft in question is an L-21 fixed-wing single-engine aircraft. Its registered owner is Tumbling Mirth MT LLC, a company in Helena, Montana.
McClain said he hadn’t spoken to the pilot, so he wasn’t sure what caused the aircraft to land on Sheep Mountain, nor how it landed upside-down. All he knew was that the pilot walked away unharmed.
“I don’t know what he was trying to do,” he said. “The pilot didn’t notify us that he had gone down, but (USAFRCC) told us that they’d talked to the pilot and everything was fine.”
The pilot also didn’t inform the Park County Sheriff’s Office that his aircraft was still on Sheep Mountain until he confirmed it on Sunday while PCSAR was mobilizing to respond to the second call.
“(The pilot) had notified the Federal Aviation Administration but, unfortunately, didn’t notify the Sheriff’s Office or the local airport of what had transpired,” Park County Sheriff Darrell Steward said in a statement. “The plane’s registered owner was contacted and advised that he was unhurt and was the one who crashed it.”
Heavy Lift
How do you get an upside-down aircraft off a mountain? Not by its own power.
A photograph shared by the Park County Sheriff’s Office shows the fixed-wing aircraft needs some fixing before it's airworthy. Even if it could be flipped right-side up, the top of the fin is smashed, and there isn’t a sufficiently long and flat area for it to take off from the top of Sheep Mountain.
Because Sheep Mountain is located on land managed by the Bureau of Land Management, the plane’s owner, who was also the pilot, will have to coordinate with them, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the National Transportation Safety Board to recover the aircraft.
McClain said the pilot was coordinating with a company that operates a heavy-lift helicopter in Bozeman, Montana. They’ll, presumably, fly to Sheep Mountain to retrieve the L-21, which can weigh up to 12,499 pounds.
“They’re supposedly on deck to come get it here in the next week or so, weather permitting,” he said.
