Pilot apparently tried to avoid dog on Alaska runway before deadly crash, NTSB says

CBS News

30-04-2025

A loose dog may have played a role in a small plane crash that left two people dead and one seriously injured in Alaska earlier this week, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
The crash happened Monday afternoon near the airport in Nanwalek, a rural area in southern Alaska's Kenai Peninsula, officials said. A Cessna struck the runway while trying to land and proceeded to slide into the water at the end of the airstrip, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a preliminary report.
Alaska State Troopers identified the people killed in the collision as 48-year-old Daniel Bunker, the pilot, and 37-year-old Jenny Irene Miller, a passenger. They have not identified the third person inside the plane but described him as a man who suffered serious injuries. He was medevaced from the scene of the crash to a hospital in Anchorage, state troopers said.
Clint Johnson, the chief of NTSB Alaska, told CBS affiliate KTUU that an investigation is underway to determine what exactly caused the Cessna to go down. But he said the probe so far indicated that Bunker apparently lost control of the aircraft as he attempted to avoid a dog on the airstrip during landing.
"What we understand now is, there may have been an animal, namely a dog, that was on the runway," Johnson told KTUU, adding that Bunker informed another plane arriving behind him that he planned to initiate a "go-around," signaling a discontinuation of the landing attempt and subsequent change of course.
"He made a right turn away from the runway, pretty steep climb, and unfortunately there was a loss of control," said the NTSB Alaska chief.
NTSB Alaska chief Clint Johnson said the pilot of a Cessna that crashed Monday along the Kenai Peninsula may have been trying to avoid a loose dog on the runway when he attempted to land.
KTUU
Johnson attributed the loss to "an aerodynamic stall," which means the wing likely stopped producing lift — the force that keeps a plane in the air.
"We don't want to draw any conclusions at this point," Johnson said. "We're still are in the very formative stages."
Part of the NTSB investigation will examine the airplane itself, once the wreckage is fully recovered. According to Johnson, the remains of the Cessna will be taken to the city of Homer and, eventually, Anchorage, where officials will look closely at it "to make sure that there were no mechanical issues that led to this loss of control."
Miller and Bunker's bodies have been sent to the State Medical Examiner, which will perform autopsies on both, according to state troopers.